As I posted previously, I was on the research team for a national study of American abortion attitudes, along with Dr. Tricia Bruce (PI), Dr. Kendra Hutchens, Bridget Ritz, and Dr. Patricia Tevington. Funded my the University of Notre Dame’s McGrath Institute for Church Life, the final report, How Americans Understand Abortion, authored by Bruce, has just been released. The report offers a thoughtful analysis of over 200 interviewees’ thoughts on the topic and helps us understand the ways people make moral sense of their personal and social worlds. To offer you a sneak peek, below are the seven major findings:

1. Americans don’t talk much about abortion.
2. Survey statistics oversimplify Americans’ abortion attitudes.
3. Position labels are imprecise substitutes for actual views toward abortion.
4. Abortion talk concerns as much what happens before and after as it does abortion itself.
5. Americans ponder a “good life” as much as they do “life.”
6. Abortion is not merely political to everyday Americans, but intimately personal.
7. Americans don’t “want” abortion.

Read the full report to learn more!