The Flower of Human Perfection: Moses Mendelssohn's Defense of Rationalist Aesthetics

Pregnancy is a life altering event for which, in the case of this study, there can be no going back.

The aim of this dissertation was to understand the decision-making process of pregnant women as they consider undergoing prenatal genetic testing.

The central question was: How do women gather information, analyze it, and then make their decision to undergo or forgo prenatal genetic testing for fetal anomalies?

Grounded Theory methodology was used to guide this study.

Prenatal attachment, pregnancy anxiety measures and demographic data were also collected as means of better describing the 10 women who participated in this study.

Participants spoke of fearing what could be. They were guided by considering their family needs and by doing what was best for their babies.

They managed their fear anxiety through selective disclosure, limiting information sources, selecting tests based on information and by deciding to solicit or not solicit input from the unborn babies' fathers.

Of the 10 women in the study only two chose to have prenatal genetic testing.

None of the women were told they were at an increased risk of having a baby with a genetic anomaly.

For the two women who had prenatal genetic testing, neither were positive for a genetic anomaly.

Hence all participants were able to embrace their pregnancies and let go of the fear of having to make the worst decision ever.