BESC1120 Study Guide - Final Guide: Opioid, Chaos Theory, Assisted Suicide
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EXAM NOTES - Developmental Psychology
Death – Endings
Lecture 12
Chapter 18: Dying, death and bereavement:
Attitudes towards death:
Death less familiar in 21st century
Death most common ages over 65 – used to be much younger
Children used to die of childhood diseases, many women died giving birth
Most deaths now take place in hospitals, nursing homes, other formal settings
Death removed from everyday life
Death more private rather than public
Grief expressed more privately – community life goes on
“death denied” attitude
Most people feel uncomfortable around death
Because of this may send wrong message to children – confuse them
Avoid even word death - language about it often euphemisms (go to heaven, pass away)
Often removed from every-day life
Children likely to be kept away from funerals
Death awareness movement
New meanings for death and dying
Cultural analysis of attitudes
Promoted the notion of the good death
Was a response to the increasing number of very old people in society, the prolongation of the
dying process, the anxieties of the nuclear age, 1960’s perspective that asserted the rights of
the ignored and underprivileged (the dying in this case), and the HIV aids epidemic,
Let to analysis of cultural messages about death, increases sensitivity to dying, increased
education about death
Defining Death:
Previously absence of respiration and heartbeat
Now criteria focus on brain death – irreversible coma
No sign of normal reflexes, unresponsiveness to external stimuli
No longer hope, life supports should be turned off
Definition critical for issues of organ transplant
Conflicting views in Japan and US
Reflection of cultural views on death^ science always interacts with culture
Organ transplant technology – harvested from the brain dead and used in others
Children’s understanding of death…
By middle childhood – most children understand the irreversible and permanent nature of death
Factors that affect understanding – experience with death, religious teachings, candid and sensitive
discussion with adults
Egocentric view of the world – young children – may think its their fault – their thoughts/wishes
caused the death
Adolescent’s understanding of death…
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Logically understand death – but problems applying idea to their real lives
High risk activities
Talks with parents help understanding
Adulthood and Understanding of death…
Early adulthood = avoidance: death anxiety, considered distant
Middle = begin to think of death, aware of limited time left to live
Late = think and talk more of death, practical concern about how and when
Facing ones own death:
Recognising mortality increases with age
Death is irreversible and universal
Death Acceptance:
Neutral acceptance (reality that is neither welcomed nor feared)
Approach orientated acceptance (passage to happy afterlife)
Escape orientated acceptance (accepting it as escape from painful experience)
Death Anxiety:
High death anxeity is associated with low death acceptance
Age (death becomes more salient with age, some evidence of decline with age), gender (conflicting
results), religiosity (strong and low religiosity relates to lower anxiety than medium religiosity, all
impact on which aspects of death anxiety are most prominent to the individual
End of life choices – will/advanced directives can reduce death anxiety
Death anxieties: fear of being destroyed, dear of premature death, fear of conscious death, fear of
the unknown, fear of the dying process, fear of the dead, fear of the body after death, fear for
significant others
Different aspects of death arouse anxiety in different people
Older adults less avoidant of it
Decline with age across all of the fears, except fear of the unknown
Factors that influence thoughts about dying – cause of death (nature of disease), personality, coping style,
family members, health professionals, spirituality and religion, culture
Experience of death
Western attributes of a good death
Death awareness movement – open rather than closed awareness
Respecting choices – advanced planning/advanced directives/living wills
The dying process:
Kubler Ross
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Document Summary
Death most common ages over 65 used to be much younger. Children used to die of childhood diseases, many women died giving birth. Most deaths now take place in hospitals, nursing homes, other formal settings. Grief expressed more privately community life goes on. Because of this may send wrong message to children confuse them. Avoid even word death - language about it often euphemisms (go to heaven, pass away) Children likely to be kept away from funerals. Let to analysis of cultural messages about death, increases sensitivity to dying, increased education about death. Now criteria focus on brain death irreversible coma. No sign of normal reflexes, unresponsiveness to external stimuli. No longer hope, life supports should be turned off. Definition critical for issues of organ transplant. Reflection of cultural views on death^ science always interacts with culture. Organ transplant technology harvested from the brain dead and used in others.
