Young women’s transition to motherhood: relations with partners and visions of motherhood

Abstract

The study uses a processual approach drawing on the modern definition of reproductive health, which recommends individualised measurements of populations. A case study analysis is performed to build a comprehensive empirical model of transitions in young women’s relations with their partners and visions of motherhood, which are critical to understanding young adult females’ reproductive health. Data necessary to reconstruct the setup of individual life paths were collected using exploratory interviews and questionnaires and analysed in the framework of the Strategy of Process Transformation Reconstruction (PTR). The PTR strategy is an innovative tool that combines the qualitative analysis of individual cases and C4.5 Quinlan’s algorithm to make generalisation. 
 The empirical model of internally diverse types of relationships and visions of motherhood formed by young Polish women consists of a sequence of variants showing the evolution of the character, and ways of building and integrating intimate relationships with motherhood. The model can serve as a matrix for creating analytical categories that can be used to describe young women’s relations with their partners and visions of motherhood, construct psychological scales, and plan therapeutic procedures.