Euthanasia: American attitudes toward the physician's role.

This is a study of American public opinion toward euthanasia and the physician's role in performing it. The authors examine how these attributes are affected by religious affiliation, religious self-perception, political self-perception and education. The data include 8384 American respondents from years 1977, 1978, 1982, 1985 and 1988 of the General Social Survey conducted by the National Opinion Research Center. The findings suggest that highly educated, politically liberal respondents with a less religious self-perception are most likely to accept active euthanasia or suicide in the case of terminally ill patient. The data also show that Americans tend to draw a distinction between the suicide of a terminally ill patient and active euthanasia under the care of a physician, preferring to have the physician perform this role in the dying process. The tendency to see a distinction between active euthanasia and suicide was clearly affected by religious affiliation and education.