Adolescents' attitudes to abortion in samples from Italy and Sweden.

Both Italy and Sweden have legislated abortion without grounds since the 1970s but background conditions in the two countries are bipolar. The overall purpose of the present study was to investigate a sample of adolescents from Italy and Sweden regarding their attitudes towards abortion and their knowledge of family planning and to compare the results from the two countries. A questionnaire was distributed among 400 adolescents, 177 from Stockholm, Sweden and 223 from Rome and Locri, Italy. Whereas Sweden is a relatively homogeneous country. Italy has large regional differences regarding social and other aspects. For this reason two regions of Italy were studied separately. The participants were all secondary school students. The results indicated that nearly all adolescents in both countries were concerned about abortion and its consequences, although their concern was expressed differently, in accordance with their religious and cultural norms and also with their background in sexual education. The present study raises questions concerning the knowledge level as an outcome of sex education programs. In fact comparing the answers between the Italian and the Swedish samples no particular difference, in favour of the Swedish adolescents was noticed.