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Threat of biographical disruption: the gendered construction and experience of infertility following cancer for women and men

Overview of attention for article published in BMC Cancer, March 2018
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About this Attention Score

  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (88th percentile)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (96th percentile)

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1 news outlet
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14 X users

Citations

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54 Dimensions

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Title
Threat of biographical disruption: the gendered construction and experience of infertility following cancer for women and men
Published in
BMC Cancer, March 2018
DOI 10.1186/s12885-018-4172-5
Pubmed ID
Authors

Jane M. Ussher, Janette Perz, The Australian Cancer and Fertility Study Team (ACFST)

Abstract

Infertility is a major concern for people with cancer and their partners. There have been calls for further research on the gendered nature of psychosocial, emotional and identity concomitants of fertility post-cancer across women and men. The gendered construction and experience of infertility following cancer was examined through a survey of 693 women and 185 men, and in-depth one-to-one interviews with a subsample of survey respondents, 61 women and 17 men, purposively selected across cancer types and age groups. Thematic decomposition was used to examine the open ended survey responses and interviews. The chi square test for independence was used to test for group differences between women and men on closed survey items. In the thematic decomposition, infertility was identified as providing a 'Threat of Biographical Disruption' which impacted on life course and identity, for both women and men. Subthemes identified were: 'Parenthood as central to adulthood'; 'Infertility as a threat to gender identity'; ' Unknown fertility status and delayed parenthood'; 'Feelings of loss and grief'; 'Absence of understanding and support'; 'Benefit finding and renegotiation of identity'. In the closed survey items, the majority of women and men agreed that they had always 'wanted to be a parent' and that 'parenthood was a more important life goal than a satisfying career'. 'It is hard to feel like a true adult until you have a child' and impact upon 'my feelings about myself as a man or a woman' was reported by both women and men, with significantly more women reporting 'I feel empty because of fertility issues'. Many participants agreed they 'could visualise a happy life without a child' and there is 'freedom without children'. Significantly more men than women reported that they had not discussed fertility with a health care professional. The fear of infertility following cancer, or knowledge of compromised fertility, can have negative effects on identity and psychological wellbeing for both women and men, serving to create biographical disruption. Support from family, partners and health care professionals can facilitate renegotiation of identity and coping.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 14 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 124 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 124 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 16 13%
Student > Bachelor 14 11%
Student > Doctoral Student 11 9%
Student > Ph. D. Student 8 6%
Other 7 6%
Other 23 19%
Unknown 45 36%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Psychology 22 18%
Nursing and Health Professions 21 17%
Medicine and Dentistry 16 13%
Social Sciences 8 6%
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology 4 3%
Other 9 7%
Unknown 44 35%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 20. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 09 June 2021.
All research outputs
#1,672,179
of 23,881,329 outputs
Outputs from BMC Cancer
#234
of 8,483 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#37,887
of 333,962 outputs
Outputs of similar age from BMC Cancer
#9
of 219 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 23,881,329 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 93rd percentile: it's in the top 10% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 8,483 research outputs from this source. They receive a mean Attention Score of 4.4. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 97% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 333,962 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 88% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 219 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 96% of its contemporaries.