Exploring Risk Factors and Motivations for the Use of Reproductive Coercion Behaviors

Understanding use of RC behaviors and the motivations behind pregnancy-coercive behaviors will enable us to address primary prevention – specifically associated factors and motivation.

This convergent parallel mixed methods study uses an online crowdsourcing platform to recruit a large sample (n=3400) of people assigned male at birth (AMAB) for RC use screening questions, to examine correlates of RC use. Those who report any history of RC use will be asked to participate in in-depth interviews to thoroughly explore motivations for use of RC behaviors. This design enables us to identify factors associated with use of RC as well as protective factors, and to explore how people who use RC understand their use of these behaviors, in order to inform development of interventions for primary prevention. This study is powered to enable intersectional analysis by race and other identities, to enable conclusions about the impact of various forms of discrimination.

Aim 1: Analyze individual and structural correlates of RC perpetration among people who identify as male.

Aim 2: Explore reasons for using RC behaviors. What do these behaviors mean to the person using them? How do they justify or explain or rationalize their use?