The level of anxiety in counseling

Pastoral Psychology -     

Death anxiety in Japan and Australia

This study compared death anxiety ratings as measured by the Templer Death Anxiety Scale (Templer, 1970) in 121 Japanese and 139 Australian subjects. Japanese subjects had significantly higher death anxiety scores than their Australian counterparts. Australian women scored significantly higher than Australian men, but no sex differences were found in the Japanese sample. A slight but statistically significant positive correlation was found between age and death anxiety scores. This study contradicted other research that indicated that Eastern cultural attitudes mitigated anxiety about death. These findings are discussed in relation to the complex relationship between culture and death anxiety as well as in relation to problems inherent in our current conception of death anxiety.     

Death as a counseling concern

Both the professional and the popular attention now given to the topic of death and issues reflecting a death theme indicate that these areas can be of great concern to many of the individuals served by counselors. If counselors are going to respond to these concerns, they must prepare by investigating the available information on death and related topics, exploring their own feelings and beliefs about these same areas, and developing an initial foundation for providing service to clients who are manifesting a problem that is death-related.     

Death, suicide and the older adult.

Elderly people who are at high risk for suicide often have characteristics that are associated with reduced opportunity or inclination to communicate (e.g., male, living alone, residing in a low-income transient urban area, suffering from a depressive state). This paper attempts to provide converging perspectives on death and suicide from the standpoints of both the external observer and the elderly person. An interpretation of the statistical pattern is followed by a critique of current policy proposals for limiting society's response to the needs of vulnerable people on the basis of a "natural life span." Studies of elderly people themselves reveal a great diversity of attitudes toward death that is not well served by generalizations and stereotypes. However, it appears that stressful conditions of life arouse more anxiety among older people than does the prospect of death.     

Death anxiety in Egyptian samples

The present research was an attempt to determine the Egyptian death anxiety level and correlates, and to compare such data with those of Americans. The sample consisted of 673 Egyptian males and 770 females in 13 subgroups. The Arabic version of the Templer's Death Anxiety Scale (DAS) was administered. Testing bilingual Ss, test-retest reliability and factorial validity of the DAS in Egyptian Ss has been adequately demonstrated. However, split-half reliability was not high. The mean DAS scores for Egyptians were a little higher than those of Americans. Egyptian females had higher DAS scores than males. The DAS correlates significantly with the Manifest Anxiety Scale and State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. However, DAS correlates with Trait Anxiety more than with State Anxiety. There is a significant correlation between the DAS and the Neuroticism subscale of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. Death anxiety and general anxiety constitute two distinct factors.     

Attitudes toward physician-assisted suicide and death anxiety

A scale to measure approval of physician-assisted suicide was devised. Scores on the scale were uncorrelated to death anxiety in a sample of 168 students.     

Death anxiety and death depression in Spanish nurses

This study examined the dimensional structure of Tomás-Sábado and Gómez-Benito's Death Anxiety Inventory and Templer, et al.'s Death Depression Scale-Revised. The responses of 244 Spanish nurses to the Spanish forms of both scales were evaluated by means of a principal axis factor analysis with direct Oblimin rotation. Five significant factors were identified: Internally Generated Death Anxiety, Death Depression, Externally Generated Death Anxiety, Death Threat, and Death Sadness, accounting for 51.6% of the variance. The distribution of the factor loadings for the items of both scales on the five factors supported the discriminant validity of the constructs specific to each of the scales and justified their use in evaluating death anxiety and death depression independently.     

Death anxiety in Spain and five Arab countries

The present study compared death anxiety among volunteer undergraduates from Spain and five Arab countries, i.e., Egypt, Kuwait, Qatar, Lebanon, and Syria. The Templer Death Anxiety Scale was used in its Spanish and Arabic forms, respectively. The Mean for the Spanish sample was lower than that of their Arabic counterparts in the five countries, whether the subjects were men or women.     

Death anxiety and death obsession in Spanish students

This study examined the dimensional structure of Templer's Death Anxiety Scale and Abdel-Khalek's Death Obsession Scale. The responses of 289 Spanish students to the Spanish forms of both scales were evaluated by means of a principal components analysis with varimax rotation. Three significant factors were identified: Death Obsession, Cognitive-Affective, and Death Anxiety. The distribution of the factor loadings for the items of both scales on Factors 1 and 3 supported the discriminant validity of the constructs specific to each of the scales, while Factor 2 showed a common component in both scales characterized by cognitive and affective aspects in relation to the idea of death.     

Death anxiety, dissent, and competence

A total of 64 male undergraduates were administered a multistage interview which was structured to assess (a) their level of overtly expressed death anxiety, (b) covert (GSR) arousal to death stimuli (c) self-perceived competence, and (d) agreement with or dissent from life threatening national policies. The analyses that followed were concerned with examining the relationships among these variables. In previous studies of this kind it had been typically found that (1) self-perceived competence and magnitude of expressed death concern are inversely related and (2) overt expressions of death concern and covert physiological arousal to death cues are inversely related. Psychodynamic formulations centering on the ego-defensive nature of inhibited expressions of death anxiety have been cited to explain these past data. The current investigation proposed that the magnitude of expressed death concern would bear an inverse relationship to both felt competence and covert death arousal only when the level of overt concern was not contingent upon the individual's attitudes concerning the imminence of real life threatening circumstances in the environment. The rationale behind these predictions inheres in the notion that the neurotic components of strongly expressed death anxiety derive from its lack of anchoring in "real" external threats. Conversely, the expression of low death fear can only be regarded as "defensive" when real threats are perceived and acknowledged. The obtained results strongly support this rationale and the discussion centers on the impact of social conditions on psychodynamic processes.     

Permitting suicide of competent clients in counseling: legal and moral considerations

State statutes, case law, and professional codes of ethics in the mental health professions typically stress either a duty or the permissibility of disclosing confidential information in order to prevent clients from seriously harming themselves. These sources are intended to address cases where clients are deemed to be suffering from cognitive dysfunction for which paternalistic intervention, including involuntary hospitalization, is considered necessary to prevent self-destructive behavior. The counselor's moral and legal responsibility is less apparent when mentally competent clients desire suicide as release from irremediable suffering due to severe physical illness, and this desire is defensible within these clients' value systems. This paper will explore moral and legal dimensions of a counselor's decision not to intervene in such cases. The concept of permitted suicide will be introduced and defined, and guidelines for its application developed.     

Death anxiety and a Taoist orientation in two cultures

A negative association between having a Taoist orientation to life and death anxiety was found for a sample of 99 American students but not in a sample of 100 Turkish students.     

Death by hand grenade: altruistic suicide in combat

Durkheim's theory of suicide is examined as it bears on the concept of altruistic suicide. A subtype called heroic altruistic suicide or self-sacrifice is identified. Relationships are hypothesized between cohesion and self-sacrifice and rank and self-sacrifice, and they are tested in combat situations, utilizing official published information on the Congressional Medal of Honor. Altruistic suicide is found to be higher in more cohesive than in less cohesive groups and more likely among enlisted men than among career officers and noncommissioned officers. In addition to testing hypotheses empirically, this study elaborates Durkheim by extending his analysis of altruistic suicide and clarifies his work by delineating sources of error in his hypotheses.