“It’s not something you expect a 15-year-old to be sad about”: Sources of Uncertainty and Strategies of Uncertainty Management among Adolescent Women Who Have Experienced Miscarriage

Whittney H. Darnell, Alison N. Buckley, Allison M. Gordon

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

9 Scopus citations

Abstract

Approximately 10%–25% of adolescent pregnancies end in miscarriage, yet we know little about the experience of miscarriage among women in this age group. To better understand the medical and psychosocial challenges faced by adolescent women who experience a miscarriage, we conducted interviews with 31 college-aged women who had experienced a miscarriage between the ages of 15 and 19. We analyzed interview transcripts using qualitative descriptive analysis and found that adolescent women experience various medical (e.g., insufficient medical knowledge, unknown etiology), personal (e.g., competing identities, lack of autonomy in decision-making), and relational (e.g., emotional invalidation, relational insecurity) sources of uncertainty in miscarriage in ways that are unique to the population of adolescent women. Women in our sample appraised their uncertainty positively and negatively (sometimes simultaneously) and reported using a variety of management strategies to facilitate their desired level of uncertainty, including information seeking, avoidance, health behavior change, and reframing the miscarriage.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1795-1805
Number of pages11
JournalHealth Communication
Volume34
Issue number14
DOIs
StatePublished - Dec 6 2019

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, © 2018 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Health(social science)
  • Communication

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