Conceptualizing Abortion as Adaptive: Throwing the Baby Out With the Bathwater?

Abstract

In this paper, we respond to Kimport and McLemore (2022), Leyser-Whalen (2022), Mavuso (2022), and Shaw’s (2022) commentaries on our article (Adair & Lozano, 2022) proposing the advantages of using multiple psychological perspectives to situate abortion decisions as adaptive choices, existing in stigmatized spaces, that can increase individual’s ability to survive and thrive. We agree that the future of abortion scholarship should address outstanding issues such as the centering of ciswomen, but we continue to endorse the value of research - including work incorporating large-scale models - to explore the environmental, developmental, and social factors that shape reproductive decision-making.