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Family Planning Perspectives pared with 63% of those among Hispanic women and 54% of those among white and other non-Hispanic women.2 The greater prevalence of unplanned pregnancy among low-income women and among black or Hispanic women reflects their lower levels of contraceptive use3 and higher likelihood of contraceptive failure.4 However, it is not clear whether racial and ethnic differences simply represent the greater socioeconomic disadvantage of black and Hispanic women or if they result from other characteristics of or barriers faced by these women. In this article, we seek to learn directly from low-income women about their perceptions of and experiences with contraceptive methods and contraceptive service providers. To help identify characteristics that might be risk factors for not using a method, for being dissatisfied with a method or for using one inconsistently, we explore the effects of women’s personal characteristics, their relationships, their childbearing experience and plans, their motivation to avoid unplanned pregnanJacqueline Darroch Forrest is senior vice president and vice president for research and Jennifer J. Frost is senior research associate, The Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI), New York. The authors would like to thank David Michaelson and Denise Marks of Market Development, Inc., for their assistance in the fielding of this survey, as well as Theresa Camelo, Saba Zeleka, Michele Bolzan and Suzette Audam of AGI for their assistance during various phases of the project. The authors also thank the more than 20 members of the advisory committee for the study, who met several times during the course of the project and provided valuable insight and direction. The study on which this article is based was supported by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation and The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The Family Planning Attitudes And Experiences of Low-Income Women