Producing change in attitudes toward abortion.

During the 1969-1970 school year, 351 upperclassmen at a southeastern university were used in a study on the use of different communication methods to change attitudes toward abortion. Following the pretest questionnaire, the group was divided into 4 groups and treated in the following ways: 1) a panel from the group presented pros and cons of abortion; 2) the group broke into 5-member discussion groups to talk about attitudes toward abortion; 3) a movie on normal birth was presented to this group; and 4) the 4th group received no interim abortion-related communication. The movie had no effect on abortion attitudes. The discussions had a slight liberalizing effect on abortion attitudes. Less than 3% of the students in the survey changed their attitude.