Genetic Ties and the Family: The Impact of Paternity Testing on Parents and Children (Bioethics)

Genetic Ties and the Family brings together experts in history, law, ethics, philosophy, psychology, social work, and sociology to explore the tension between biological and social conceptions of parentage. The contributors consider the effect of DNA-based paternity testing on family relationships and discuss the ethical, legal, and social implications.

These essays reflect the changing concepts of parenthood, along with social factors that heighten conflict, such as single-parent adoption, gay and lesbian parents, child support laws, and new reproductive technologies. Building on scholarship of the last quarter century―including the latest developments in law and social science research―this volume will inform the development of legislation regulating genetic testing and the use of test results in establishing parental rights.

Contributors: Lori B. Andrews, J.D., Chicago-Kent College of Law; Elizabeth Bartholet, J.D., Harvard Law School; Jeffrey Blustein, Ph.D., Albert Einstein College of Medicine; Nancy E. Dowd, J.D., Levin College of Law, University of Florida; Michael Grossberg, Ph.D., Indiana University; Dorothy Nelkin, B.A., New York University; Jeffrey Parness, J.D., North Illinois University College of Law; Dianne Scott-Jones, Ph.D., Boston College; Daniel Wulff, Ph.D., Raymond A. Kent School of Social Work, University of Louisville.

Mark A. Rothstein is Herbert F. Boehl Chair of Law and Medicine, and director of the Institute for Bioethics, Health Policy and Law at the University of Louisville School of Medicine.

Thomas H. Murray is president of the Hastings Center.

Gregory E. Kaebnick is the editor of Hastings Center Report, a publication of The Hastings Center, and a coeditor of two books, Reprogenetics: Law, Policy, and Ethical Issues and Genetic Ties and the Family: The Impact of Paternity Testing on Parents and Children, both published by Johns Hopkins.