Paper short abstract:

Fetal personhood is a widely debated among medical and legal professionals. What is missing from such an approach is the perspectives of women themselves, and an understanding of when and by what means they come to view their fetus subjectively as a person.

Paper long abstract:

When a fetus becomes a person is contentious within academia, and possibly more so outside of academia. The current literature focuses on when medical professionals, policy forming bodies, and the law should consider the fetus a person. What remains unclear is, at which point pregnant women assign personhood to their fetus. Specifically, whether there is a connection between the assignment of personhood - as expressed through identification with the fetus as a baby - and women's experiences of obstetric ultrasound. This research explores at which point pregnant women begin to think about the fetus as a baby by retrospectively discussing their experiences of obstetric ultrasound. The findings, based on two semi-structured narrative interviews, indicate that the technologically mediated gaze of obstetric ultrasound does influence a change from objective to subjective language use when women refer to the fetus. This is particularly apparent when fetal 'sex' is confirmed during the ultrasound, with both women solidifying in the use of the term baby from the point of 'sex' confirmation onwards.