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Discover our current projects

The Canada Research Chair in Third-Party Reproduction and Family Ties is currently conducting several research projects.

Discover all the projects

Intergenerational Ties Through the Lens of Third-Party Reproduction

What is the experience of parents of donors or surrogates? How do grandparents whose grandchildren are born through sperm, egg donation or surrogacy develop their grandparental identity? Who is the donor or surrogate for these grandparents? Very few studies have explored these questions, and this project is the first of its kind in Canada and one of the few globally to investigate the experience of parents of donors or surrogates, as well as grandparents in receiving families.

Contact Project : The experience of gamete donors contacted by their donor offspring

The Contact project aims to examine situations in which a gamete donor is directly contacted by a donor offspring, whom they did not previously know. The study will help better understand the consequences of the progressive expansion of donor conceived people’s access to information about their origins. It will provide pathways for people working in the field of assisted reproduction with regard to supporting users and could be mobilized by lawmakers interested in the issue.

Surrogates’ Voices

While the media describe a vast range of positive and negative experiences on the part of women who act as surrogates in Canada, we know very little about the way the surrogacies they are involved in actually function. Surrogates’ Voices is the first large-scale Canadian study to examine the ways surrogacy agreements are experienced, as well as the difficulties that surrogates face. The results will support the development of social practices, public policy and legislative frameworks that are more in tune with their needs.

Drifts in Donor Conception and Their Impacts on Life Trajectories

Donor conception has become democratized in recent years, with a growing number of sperm banks. Certain abuses related to this assisted reproduction procedure continue to be the subject of debate, such as the overuse of specific sperm donors for the conception of numerous children within different families and the problem of doctors’ deliberate substitution of donors at the time of conception. This project aims to document the experiences of people born from instances of such abuses, among other things in order to inform decision-makers on the repercussions of such cases and the need to better regulate donor conception.

My Mother’s Surrogacy

The My Mother’s Surrogacy project is a Canadian study that looks at the subjective experiences of surrogates’ children when it comes to the surrogacy processes in which their mothers are engaged. More than sixty children and teens have been interviewed for this project.

The news

Documentary series: Naissances du futur (Births from the future)

Directed by Claudie Simard, this series on Savoir média explores the theme of medically assisted procreation (MAP) and gives a voice to parents and researchers interested in the issue.

You'll find Isabel Côté, Chairholder and Professor of Social Work at UQO, as well as two Associated Researchers - Sabrina Zeghiche, Professor of Social Work at UQO, and Kévin Lavoie, Professor at the School of Social Work and Criminology at Université Laval.

Watch the episodes [in French only]

Comic book: Contacts: Stories from Egg and Sperm Donors

Through a series of fictional stories, learn more about the experience of sperm and egg donors who have been contacted by people conceived from their donations. The stories draw on the findings of a research project involving 27 American, Australian, and Canadian gamete donors.

Read the comic book

Report on the Découverte program of September 22, 2024

Journalist Dominique Forget's report on the Découverte program on September 22, 2024, highlights the Chair's work. The first segment, entitled La quête d'une vie, delves into the quest of donor-conceived people to discover their origins. The second segment, Fertilité et trahison, explores the issue of insemination fraud.

Tune in to this popular science program with Isabel Côté, Chairholder, and Sabrina Zeghiche, Associated Researcher.

Watch the report [in French only]

Documentary series: Porteuses de vie (Carriers of life)

By following Amélie Lemieux's quest to have another child, let's demystify the process of surrogates and meet individuals who, from near and far, have used this process to create a family. Through these encounters with families and specialists, let's take stock of the situation in Quebec.

The Chairholder, Isabel Côté, speaks in each episode of the documentary series.

Watch the episodes [in French only]

Chairholder

Isabel Côté (she/her) holds the Canada Research Chair in Third-Party Reproduction and Family Ties and is a professor in the department of social work at Université du Québec en Outaouais. She is interested in families that are created thanks to others’ contributions, particularly gamete and embryo donors and surrogate mothers.

See the chairholder’s expertise