title: [Infertility and some of its psychosocial aspects].
abstract: The paper gives account of several psychosocial aspects of infertility. Firstly, the author deals with a fact that infertility impede the desire to produce a child and the socially created need to become a parent. The M. Hunter's model of biopsychosocial aspects of reproductive problems is used as a framework for analysing the complexity of factors which influence single person's reactions to infertility and its treatment. Secondly, the authors gives a summary of feminist critique of reproductive technologies. These technologies are widely used and accepted as a way to overcome infertility, but they create some additional problems. These problems are discussed using four types of arguments: anti-biological, anti-medical, eugenic and those considering women's reactions to reproductive technologies. All of these arguments are based on feminist publications. Thirdly, the author discusses the similarities and differences in male and female reactions to infertility. It is argued that two tendencies are observed while reactions to infertility are researched: the first is see those reactions as entirely different while the second is to see them as very similar. These controversy can be explained on the ground of different research methodology, the notion of infertile persons as a homogeneous group, the lack of proper theoretical model to contain all aspects of gender differences in reactions to infertility.
authors.affiliation: Katedry Psychologii Uniwersytetu Lódzkiego.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Bielawska-Batorowicz
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007247:Infertility, Female / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy; D007248:Infertility, Male / Q000523:psychology* / Q000628:therapy*; D008297:Male