The Community Attitudes Abortion Scale (CAAS) is a 7-item measure of stigma toward women who have had abortions, views toward a friend hypothetically having an abortion and opinions on abortion regulations. Validation was done among a population of women without a history of seeking an abortion in the United States.
Geographies Tested: United States of America
Populations Included: Female
Age Range: Adults
1. Women who have had abortions are bad people
2. Women who have abortions have done something wrong
3. Women who have abortions should feel badly about themselves
*4. If a friend of mine had an abortion, I would not judge her
*5. I could support a woman who had an abortion even if I didn't agree with her decision
*6. Abortion should be legal and available
7. Do you think abortion should be legal in all cases-illegal in all cases
Response Options:
5-point Likert scale
Strongly disagree - 1
Disagree - 2
Neither agree nor disagree - 3
Agree - 4
Strongly agree - 5
Item scores are summed and then averaged. Scores can be given a dichotomous classification of "high stigma" with scores of at least 3 and "low stigma" with scores less than 3.
Cutler, A. S., Lundsberg, L. S., White, M. A., Stanwood, N. L., & Gariepy, A. M. (2021). Characterizing community-level abortion stigma in the United States. Contraception. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.contraception.2021.03.021
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