A Child's Perception of Death and Grief Essay

It is obvious that the movie My Girl illustrates several aspects of the cognitive and emotional development of children’s understanding of death. Although Vada seems to have a fairly clear understanding of the inevitability and unpredictability of death, she has some difficulty with its all-inclusiveness in that, although she is quite preoccupied with her own death, with her constant visits to the doctor reporting various fatal diseases, she does not seem to be concerned about the possible death of those close to her. This is consistent with the finding that “most children understand their own personal mortality before they understand that all people die” (p. 17, Corr & Corr, 1996). This is so despite her extensive experience with death while living in a funeral parlour.

Bereavement and loss - The loss of a loved one such as a parent, sibling, grandparent or friend can turn a child’s world upside down. Grief can bring all sorts of emotions, upset, sadness, hurt and anger because they are gone and, fear because the child may be afraid of other loved ones dying too. A child can be affected by grief for a long period of time, and this may impact on their emotional and physical

Discuss the components of a mature understanding of death, and what factors may lead to, contribute to, or affect its development.

The last step is reorganization and restoration. This phase does not occur quickly. Here people begin to sort out suspicions and attempt to identify what was lost. There is a sense of release, renewed energy, more socialization, better judgments and more stable eating and sleeping habits. Readaptation to the loss does not mean forgetting. Adults can begin to restore emotional well being by acknowledging feelings, asking for support, reestablishing routines and reaching out to others. They can care for the needs of children by listening to their feelings and fears, providing information to clarify what occurred and whether it can affect their lives and by reestablishing routines that will comfort and reassure. There are many factors that influence the reaction of a child when death is announced to them. Factors include, the way the news is

What was surprising was how direct it was in terms of the topics that discuss why someone dies and different ways a person may die. It addresses murder, suicide, war, and mentions poverty, prejudice, and drug abuse. The book is organized in a way in which they explain the different aspects of death, but will continue to talk about emotions one may feel of death. It addresses the fact that sometimes it may be difficult to come to terms that a loved one will not be around anymore and sometimes one may have dreams or nightmares after a death. Additionally, it informs the reader that it may not be easy to talk about feelings of sadness and loneliness, however, it helps to communicate those feelings if they are able to. The book then explains the changes and questions that come after someone has died; for instance, becoming worried that they or someone they love will die the same way; if a parent died, who will take care of them; and, that they may be afraid of things that they were not before. It also discusses that it is natural to feel anger and in order to cope with such strong feelings, the author gives a list of things to try in an image of a bulletin board in one of the young dinosaur’s room. These activities include punching a pillow, drawing, talking to friends, and different sports to play outside to relieve the “mad feelings”. The authors also display ways to honor the dead, giving the book a sense of unity and diversity. This book would be more suited towards children age’s five to ten and over. According to Jean Piaget’s stages of understanding, these ages would fall under the Preoperative (two to seven years old) and Concrete Operations Stage (seven to eleven years old). The Preoperative stage explains that children two to seven have their language and thinking skills developed and will use symbols to help them understand ideas. They become aware of a world that they are not the focus of; however,

The lecture on July 28th, “Children & Grief, cont.” made my mind race through the semester drawing from readings and past lectures. In particular, that we are giving children a distorted view of death in child focused media. I will agree that there is a disconnect between the version of death and dying presented

Children and adult griefs are quite similar, yet children have a smaller range of language abilities to express their emotions. When a child griefs, they can experience several characteristics depending in their age group. In the reading Grieving Children and Adolescents: Developmental Consideration, from birth to age 3 infants and children cannot understand the meaning of forever. However images, words and symbols into meaningful information. During these years, a child can have small sense about an absence from a parent who died. Also children would expect their dying member to return. In ages three to five, have a egocentric mentally. They can become verbal, express fears and believe that death is reversible. Children be believe that the

The article Death of a parent and the children’s experience, is a very interesting and informative piece. The author Rachel Fearnley, gives a powerful presentation on a child’s bereavement process. Many believe that children are unable to comprehend till the later adolescences but that death of a parent causes many developmental issues if gone unresolved. All children handle death or loss in different ways but according her extensive studies, all age groups displayed the same developmental issues. The studies conducted were not only with children but in how caregivers also approached the bereavement children. The evidence from the current research would suggest that there is a stigma attached to talking about death and dying and that practitioners find it difficult and embarrassing to discuss such topics. This sequestration leads to a pattern of communicating that avoids any involvement of such unmentionable vocabulary. Additionally, within social work practice, it has been highlighted that ‘‘practitioners are frequently required to talk with children about complicated and painful issues and during uncertain times in their lives’’ (Lefevre et al., 2008, p. 171). The need for

The tragic death of a child is full of profound pain, which affects not only individuals but whole communities. In addition to presenting a myriad of difficult emotional, cultural and age specific problems which need to be addressed for the health of all. For the purpose of this paper, the author uses mother, father, and community include all family members, including spouses, extended family, and significant others. This paper will look at grief associated with the loss of a child, the mourning tasks used in order to help survivors heal.

In the United States approximately 73,000 children die in United States each year, of which 83% have siblings. These sibling will suffer feelings of grief that are similar to those of adults, however their developmental changes their grieving process and expressions of grief. These differences can make supporting these children more challenging for adults, especially for parents that are already emotionally and physically exhausted from their own grief.

Although the phenomenon of grief is a normal, healthy response to the death of someone loved, for children it is a traumatic ripping away of everything they have known. As a result, everyday life becomes utter chaos while familiarity and comfort vanish, emotionally propelling the griever into uncharted territory with innumerable questions and fears. When those uncertainties are not dealt with appropriately, grieving children tend to imagine circumstances that may be far worse than reality” (Pond, 2013, p. 113).

The way most children respond to loss is by first encountering shock, which may be associated with numbness and denial. Secondly, they will experience a sense of yearning or protest for the object lost or the deceased. The next stages of child grief is then despair, followed by recovery where they will have an increase in their well-being, acceptance and adaptation to the loss. Yet, research suggests that if these steps of grief are not successfully completed, the child will suffer complicated grief and may regress to previous stages of development (A Developmental Psychopathology Framework of the Psychosocial Needs of Children Orphaned by HIV, 2009). During the stages of grief, a five-year-old child may be susceptible to loss of sleep, a loss of appetite, extreme tiredness and sometimes a loss of interest in life (National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes Health, 2011).

Adolescents grieving is similar to a child than an adult. Adolescents range from the ages of ten to twenty-two years old. Throughout their grieving process adolescent have a range of many emotions and inner conflicts which are greatly influenced by their biologically changes in their bodies. During times of grief, adolescents also face inner conflicts of life, death, loneliness, frustration, depression and so forth. These questions of life and death gives opportunities to many adolescents to explore their spirituality or religion. Adolescents also have an egocentric altitude, which makes them believe that their situation is different then everyone else’s. Even though the youth can be dealing with inner conflicts, many youth would not express their emotions with others. Even though adolescents may not express their feeling their actions, low grades, violence, sexual behavior is an alert sign to parents that there something wrong. Teenagers would also think that their “immoral” and would do risky activities just to test their lives.

Research has shown that 87% of young people will experience the death of a peer during adolescents and the numbers are increasing. There are many mitigating circumstances and contributing factors on how and why teen grieve. Research indicates that the peer's relationships often seem more significant to teens than family relationships (Cook & Oltjenbruns, 2004, p. 305). Also taking into consideration is that teen grief varies according to their personality and the particular relationship they had with the deceased,such as the death of a close teen may evoke more intense grief than the death of a grandparent (Schuurman, 2003, p. 1). The death or loss of a friend can be especially profound, due to the fragility of the youthful ego (Cook &

Death and dying is marked as an unavoidable event that occurs in everyone’s life. Death does not discriminate between ages; however, the amount of understanding is limited in the beginning of life. I decided to conduct research concerning the age of acceptance and recognition of mortality after speaking to my children. Each response I received showed that their thoughts were at appropriate levels of psychological advancement. However, it still did not answer some of the questions that I have regarding attitudes and the understanding of death among all ages. I wanted to know if thoughts about death are driven by age, if it is socially developed, or influenced by experience. The purpose of this research paper is also to explore how the perspective of death and dying changes as we age, how society influences our attitudes towards death, how experiences shape our attitude towards death, and how the western world celebrates death in comparison to other cultures.