By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Writer
The Family Research Council (FRC) released a study yesterday demonstrating that state parental involvement laws are very effective in reducing abortions among minors.
“The study is the first comprehensive analysis of minor abortion data from nearly all 50 states between 1985 and 1999,” the FRC said in a press release. “Overall, the findings indicate that when a state enacts a parental involvement law, the abortion rate falls by an average of approximately 13.6 percent.”
The study’s author, Michael J. New, Ph.D., assistant professor of political science at the University of Alabama and an FRC Fellow, said “This study is the first of its kind to compare different types of parental involvement laws. The study finds that more protective parental involvement laws result in even larger declines in abortion rates.”
For instance, laws that require parental consent instead of parental notification reduce the minor abortion rate by about 19 percent. Laws that mandate the involvement of two parents instead of just one parent reduce the in-state abortion rate by approximately 31 percent.
The states of Minnesota and Mississippi were found to be among the most effective in reducing abortion rates among minors.
“This study shows that parental involvement laws are an important causal factor in this decline in the overall abortion rate among minors in the United States, which has fallen by close to fifty percent between 1985 and 1999,” Dr. New said. “Currently about 36 states have a parental involvement law on the books, but some are more effective than others in their ability to reduce the incidence of abortion.”
He added: “The overwhelming evidence in support of parental involvement laws should be a boon to legislators everywhere.”
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