Brenda Major

Biography

Brenda N. Major is a professor of psychology at UC Santa Barbara.[1] She has published a number of studies on abortion with an emphasis on attributing negative psychological effects of abortion with lack of social support and stigma caused by anti-abortion protests. She was a co-author of the 1989 APA task force report which criticized Koop's failure to white-wash abortion.

• Major B, Mueller P, Hildebrandt K. Attributions, expectations, and coping with abortion. J Pers Soc Psychol. 1985;48:585-599.

• Major, B. et al. (1990). Perceived social support, self-efficacy, and adjustment to abortion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 186-197.

• Major, B., & Cozzarelli, C. (1992). Psychological predictors of adjustment to abortion. Journal of Social Issues, 48, 121-142.

• Major, B., Zubek, J. M., Cooper, M. L., Cozzarelli, C., & Richards, C. (1997). Mixed Messages: Implications of social conflict and social support within close relationships for adjustment to a stressful life event. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 72, 1349-1363.

• Major B, Richards C, Cooper ML et al: Personal resilience, cognitive appraisals, and coping: An integrative model of adjustment to abortion. J Person Soc Psychol, 1998; 74: 735752

• Major, B. & Gramzow, R.H. (1999). Abortion as a stigma: Cognitive and emotional implications of concealment. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77(4), 735-745.

• Major, B., Cozzarelli, C., Cooper, M.L., Zubek, J., Richards, C., Wilhite, M., & Gramzow, R.H. (2000). Psychological responses of women after first-trimester abortion. Archives of General Psychiatry, 57(8), 777-84. Full Text

Criticism of Major's Spin on Her Findings

Quote from Reardon Letter regarding Study by Brenda Major.

In a follow-up study of 442 women who had abortions, Major's research team tracked depression scores using the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) one hour post-abortion, one month post-abortion, and two years post-abortion. At the two year follow-up, approximately 50% of the women either refused to participate in the follow-up evaluation or could not be contacted. Among those who did participate in the two year post-abortion assessment, depression scores were significantly higher than their one hour post-abortion scores, though higher one hour post-abortion scores were also significantly predictive of higher depression scores two years later.

In addition to these important findings, the researchers found that 24.5% of the women remaining in their sample at the two-year followup had scores above the cutoff for clinical depression on the BSI depression scale.

Curiously, rather than registering alarm, the researchers’ erroneously asserted that the depression rate detected in their study was only slightly over that of American women in general by reference to a study of national prevalence conducted by Blazer, Kessler, McGonagle, and Swartz,[40] which indicated a 20% lifetime prevalence rate of major depression among women 15-35 years of age. The reason this was assertion was erroneous is that the researchers mistakenly compared their scores for depression in the most recent month to Blazer’s findings regarding lifetime prevalence rates. Fortunately, Blazer’s group also reported the prevalence of current (30 day) major depression for females aged 15-24 and 25-34, as 8.2% and 4.3% respectively. Thus, when the proper comparison is made for most recent month depression rates, these follow-up abortion studies4,5 actually found that depression rates two years after abortion were 3 to 5 times higher among women who have had an abortion compared to the general population of similarly aged women.

In my opinion, this finding that one-fourth of women two years after their abortion had high depression scores should have motivated the researchers to encourage more detailed pre-abortion screening and post-abortion counseling. But curiously, the authors appeared to generally dismiss the importance of their own findings on the basis of the hypothesis that giving birth to an unwanted pregnancy would likely incur equal or greater psychological price, a theme echoed by Schmiege and Russo. This is an extremely important hypothesis, but it is also a hypothesis, which up to that point, had never been tested. In the most recent, comprehensive review of the literature on emotional reactions to abortion and future research priorities, the absence of studies examining psychological adjustment following an unintended pregnancy using control groups (comparing those who abort to those who carry to term) is identified as a major shortcoming of the existing literature. Our original study appears to be the first to employ this very appropriate control group. We have continued to pursue this direction with two other studies that have compared the psychological wellbeing of women who carry unintended pregnancies to term with women who have abortions: one finding higher risk of long-term generalized anxiety disorder among women who abort and the other finding higher rates of substance abuse.