[Etiology and coping with involuntary childlessness--are there specificic motivations for wanting a child?]

Do patients with functional sterility have special motivations to have a child? Could these motivations be an underlying reason for their sterility opposed to patients with organic sterility? Are there any specific motivations to have a child in patients with strong desires to have children?

80 patients attending an infertility clinic were evaluated using an interview, questionnaire and Giessen-Test (GT).

The motivation to have a child is not different in women with organic and functional sterility. Women with a strong desire to have children express significantly less often, that a child would contribute for them to achieve fulfilling life. But they express more frequently the hope to find a successful treatment for their sterility.

It can not be conducted that psychosomatic disorders are the true cause for sterility in absence of organic pathology. This would not consider the complexity of psychosomatic processes. Coping mechanism are more important than the underlying etiology of sterility.