Priscilla K. Coleman is a Professor of Human Development and Family Studies at Bowling Green State University in Ohio.[1] She has published articles in peer-reviewed journals suggesting a statistical correlation between abortion and mental health problems, and has claimed in interviews that there is a causal relationship.[2][3]
Some other researchers have been unable to reproduce Coleman's results on abortion and mental health despite using the same dataset,[4] and have described her findings as "logically inconsistent" and potentially "substantially inflated" by faulty methodology.[5] The American Psychological Association (APA) and other major medical bodies have concluded that the evidence does not support a link between abortion and mental health problems,[6] and APA panelists charged with reviewing the evidence were similarly critical of the methodology of Coleman's studies.[3] Coleman has responded that she is not the only qualified scientist whose research suggests that abortion may have serious mental health risks for many women.[5]
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Coleman attended Southern Connecticut State University,[7] and has a masters degree from James Madison University and a Ph.D. from West Virginia University.[8]
Coleman's most cited work is "Self-Efficacy and Parenting Quality: Findings and Future Applications", co-authored with Katherine Hildebrandt Karraker in Developmental Review Vol. 18, no. 1 (March 1998). She has also published a series of articles reporting a correlation between induced abortion and mental-health problems, findings which have proven controversial.
In September 2011 Coleman published a meta-analysis of 22 studies, largely her own, in the British Journal of Psychiatry, which reported results that "Women who had undergone an abortion experienced an 81% increased risk of mental health problems, and nearly 10% of the incidence of mental health problems was shown to be attributable to abortion." [9] the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists responded that four previous reviews of all available material, three published and one by the RCOG guideline development group, had found that women who have abortions did not face an increased risk of mental health problems, and suggested that Coleman's results were due to her failure to control for previously existing problems.[10]
The statistical methods Coleman and her co-authors use have been criticized by the American Psychological Association (APA).[3] A panel convened by the APA found that the studies by Coleman, and her co-authors have "inadequate or inappropriate" controls and don't adequately control "for women's mental health prior to the pregnancy and abortion." [3]
Coleman, Cougle, Reardon and Rue have also been criticized by other researchers in the field. Psychologist Brenda Major published an article in the same issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal that contained Coleman's "Psychiatric admissions of low-income women following abortion and childbirth"; this article, "Psychological implications of abortion—highly charged and rife with misleading research," criticized Coleman's study, saying that it did not distinguish correlation and cause, that the direction of causality could indeed be reversed, with psychiatric problems leading to a greater incidence of women having abortions, and that the study failed to control for factors such as relationship stability and education.[11] Jillian Henderson, a professor of gynecology, and Katharine Miller wrote to the Journal of Anxiety Disorders, saying, "We believe that Cougle, et al., operate with strong political views regarding abortion, and unfortunately their biases appear to have resulted in serious methodological flaws in the analysis published in your journal. [Reardon, Coleman and Cougle] are involved in building a literature to be used in efforts to restrict access to abortion." [12] Nancy Russo, a psychology professor and abortion researcher, examined two of Coleman and Reardon's articles, and found that when the methodological flaws in the studies were corrected, the supposed correlation between abortion and poor mental health disappeared.[2]
According to a 2010 review of the group's analysis of the National Comorbidity Survey, an analysis which claimed that women who had abortions suffered from higher rates of depression and substance abuse, Coleman and her colleagues failed to control for pre-existing mental health problems and for other risk factors for mental health problems, such as sexual or physical violence.[4] Julia Steinberg, one of the researchers, said, "We were unable to reproduce the most basic tabulations of Coleman and colleagues...Moreover, their findings were logically inconsistent with other published research -- for example, they found higher rates of depression in the last month than other studies found during respondents' entire lifetimes. This suggests that the results were substantially inflated." Coleman responded that her analysis had used different methods and examined long-term psychological problems.[5]
Regarding Coleman's 2011 publication, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists responded that four previous reviews of all available material, three published and one by the RCOG guideline development group, had found that women who have abortions did not face an increased risk of mental health problems, and suggested that Coleman's results were due to her failure to control for previously existing problems.[13]