PSYC 2314 Lifespan Development

1. PSYC 2314Lifespan Development Epilogue Death and Dying

2. The Dying Person’s Emotions • Kubler-Ross’s Stages of Dying: • Denial • Anger • Bargaining • Depression • Acceptance

3. The Dying Person’s Emotions • Age-related differences in the conceptualization of death: • Young children: upset because it suggests the idea of being separated from loved ones. • Adolescents: primarily concerned with the effect of their condition on their appearance and social relationships.

4. The Dying Person’s Emotions • Young Adult: coping with dying often produces rage and depression. • Middle-Aged Adult: primarily concerned about meeting important obligations and responsibilities • Older Adult: depend more on the situation.

5. Deciding How to Die • Steps for a “Good Death”—one that occurs swiftly, with little pain, and allows the individual to die with dignity, surrounded by loved ones. • Living will • Proxy

6. Palliative Care • DNR (do not resuscitate) • Double Effect: a situation in which medication relieves pain and hastens death • Generally, few doctors and nurses are trained to handle the psychological demands of palliative care.

7. Hospice • Advantages: • Respects patients’ dignity, allowing them to have visitors at any time. • The continual presence of a close friend or family member cushions the patient against fear and loneliness of impending death. • When death does occur, the staff continues to minister to the psychological and other needs of the patient’s family.

8. Hospice • Disadvantages: • Legal and ethical questions surrounding the wisdom of a patient’s accepting a death sentence, perhaps prematurely, and simply waiting to die. • Patients must be terminally ill; it’s restricted to a minority of the dying. • Program may grow so rapidly that it outstrips available well-trained personnel. Potential burnout of both professionals and volunteers.

9. Deciding How to Die • Physician-assisted suicide: someone provides the means for a person to end his or her life • Voluntary euthanasia: someone intentionally acts to terminate the life of a suffering person.

10. Social Context of Dying • Religious Variations • Buddhists: disease and death are among life’s inevitable sufferings • Hindus and Sikhs: helping the dying to relinquish their ties to this world and prepare for the next is considered an obligation for the immediate family. • Jewish: preparations for death are not emphasized because hope for life will never be extinguished. • Christians: death is the beginning of eternity in heaven or hell, and thus welcome or fear it.

11. Social Context of Dying • Cultural Variations • African traditions: elders take on an important new status through death • Muslim nations: death affirms faith in Allah and caring for the dying is a holy reminder of mortality.

12. Social Context of Dying • Two themes that emerge in cultural variations of death practices are: • Religious and spiritual concerns often reemerge • Returning to one’s roots is a common urge.

13. Social Context of Dying • Mourning Process • More private, less emotional, and less religious. • Small memorial services or cremations have generally replaced large funeral. • Bereavement • Much-needed support of friends and family has essentially given way to well-meaning advice that counsels indulging in everything except feelings of grief.

14. Social Context of Dying • Steps to help someone recover from bereavement: • Listens • Sympathizes • Not ignore the real pain and complicated emotions involved in the recovery process