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High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia

BACKGROUND: In Australia, the National Health and Medical Research Council has banned the use of assisted reproductive technology for social sex selection, but notes “there is limited research into the question of whether Australians support the use of sex selection for non-medical purposes”. This p...

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Autores principales: Kippen, Rebecca, Gray, Edith, Evans, Ann
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6125943/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30185179
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12978-018-0577-5
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author Kippen, Rebecca
Gray, Edith
Evans, Ann
author_facet Kippen, Rebecca
Gray, Edith
Evans, Ann
author_sort Kippen, Rebecca
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: In Australia, the National Health and Medical Research Council has banned the use of assisted reproductive technology for social sex selection, but notes “there is limited research into the question of whether Australians support the use of sex selection for non-medical purposes”. This paper investigates Australian attitudes to sex-selection technology by different means (IVF, abortion, and a hypothetical pill), for different reasons (medical, family balancing, any reason), and by differing respondent characteristics (age, sex, education and religiosity). METHODS: In 2007 and 2016, the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes (AuSSA) collected data on the attitudes of Australian adults to sex selection through IVF, abortion, and a hypothetical pill. We calculate population-weighted distributions and 95% confidence intervals of responses, and carry out logistic regressions to investigate the demographic characteristics of Australians who strongly disapprove of IVF or abortion for sex selection. RESULTS: In 2016, around three-quarters of AuSSA respondents were opposed to legalising sex selection through IVF for any reason, or for family balancing for a second or third child. Thirty-seven per cent were opposed to IVF for medical sex selection. Two-thirds of respondents in both 2007 and 2016 disapproved or strongly disapproved of IVF for sex selection, while the proportion who strongly disapproved increased from 31 to 40%. Disapproval/strong disapproval of abortion for sex selection increased from 74 to 81% from 2007 to 2016, while strong disapproval alone rose from 44 to 55%. More than 70% of respondents in both 2007 and 2016 stated that a hypothetical pill for sex selection should not be legal. Our analysis finds that female, young, more-educated, and more religious respondents are more likely to strongly disapprove of sex selection via IVF or abortion, and that the increase in those who strongly disapprove from 2007 to 2016 is statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: Australians generally disapprove of the use of sex-selection technology. If legislation is to be guided by community attitudes, then the prohibition against sex selection for non-medical purposes through assisted reproductive technology should be maintained.
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spelling pubmed-61259432018-09-10 High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia Kippen, Rebecca Gray, Edith Evans, Ann Reprod Health Research BACKGROUND: In Australia, the National Health and Medical Research Council has banned the use of assisted reproductive technology for social sex selection, but notes “there is limited research into the question of whether Australians support the use of sex selection for non-medical purposes”. This paper investigates Australian attitudes to sex-selection technology by different means (IVF, abortion, and a hypothetical pill), for different reasons (medical, family balancing, any reason), and by differing respondent characteristics (age, sex, education and religiosity). METHODS: In 2007 and 2016, the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes (AuSSA) collected data on the attitudes of Australian adults to sex selection through IVF, abortion, and a hypothetical pill. We calculate population-weighted distributions and 95% confidence intervals of responses, and carry out logistic regressions to investigate the demographic characteristics of Australians who strongly disapprove of IVF or abortion for sex selection. RESULTS: In 2016, around three-quarters of AuSSA respondents were opposed to legalising sex selection through IVF for any reason, or for family balancing for a second or third child. Thirty-seven per cent were opposed to IVF for medical sex selection. Two-thirds of respondents in both 2007 and 2016 disapproved or strongly disapproved of IVF for sex selection, while the proportion who strongly disapproved increased from 31 to 40%. Disapproval/strong disapproval of abortion for sex selection increased from 74 to 81% from 2007 to 2016, while strong disapproval alone rose from 44 to 55%. More than 70% of respondents in both 2007 and 2016 stated that a hypothetical pill for sex selection should not be legal. Our analysis finds that female, young, more-educated, and more religious respondents are more likely to strongly disapprove of sex selection via IVF or abortion, and that the increase in those who strongly disapprove from 2007 to 2016 is statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: Australians generally disapprove of the use of sex-selection technology. If legislation is to be guided by community attitudes, then the prohibition against sex selection for non-medical purposes through assisted reproductive technology should be maintained. BioMed Central 2018-09-06 /pmc/articles/PMC6125943/ /pubmed/30185179 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12978-018-0577-5 Text en © The Author(s). 2018 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Research
Kippen, Rebecca
Gray, Edith
Evans, Ann
High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title_full High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title_fullStr High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title_full_unstemmed High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title_short High and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in Australia
title_sort high and growing disapproval of sex-selection technology in australia
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6125943/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30185179
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12978-018-0577-5
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