Although younger people are becoming more positive towards surrogate mothers, current-day attitudes to surrogacy are still broadly negative, attendees at the annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology have been told. Presenter Olga van den Akker, from Middlesex University in the UK, added that previous stigmatization of surrogate mothers in the media had added to the reluctance to undertake this treatment option. Van den Akker said that attitudes towards advertising for surrogates, the consequences of surrogacy, and factors that induce women to become surrogates differed between groups, as did reasons for wanting to become parents themselves. "Women who were potentially willing to become surrogates were more likely to say that they would be happy to be identified as the surrogate to the couple and the child," said van den Akker. "Those who thought that parenthood was very important were also more likely to be willing to help others to become parents like themselves."
"We need to do further research with larger numbers," she added, "to enable us to see whether the attitudes we found translate into actual behavior. Interestingly, we found that the group who was definitely not interested in becoming a surrogate mother also scored significantly more negatively on advertising, inducements, and the consequences of surrogacy. They also rated reasons for not wishing to have a child such as 'parenthood restricts careers', and 'parenthood is not the most important goal in life', higher than potential surrogates."
The researchers say that this would seem to imply that these negative feelings towards surrogacy and parenthood in general are held by that part of the population which is not involved with surrogacy. These factors are likely to influence the reports of stigma associated with surrogacy, and it is possible that this could be overcome by linking alternative means of becoming a family to positive (rather than negative) family values.
"We also believe that, as surrogacy becomes less stigmatized, families who have children born in this way will be more likely to disclose the means of conception, not just to their children, but also to their family and friends, leaving them in better psychological health," concluded van den Akker.
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Source: European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology
