Death Anxiety, Death Competency and Self-Actualization in Hospice Volunteers

ABSTRACT

A total of 248 hospice volunteers completed the Personal Orientation Inventory, the Templer/McMordie Death Anxiety Scale, the Bugen Coping with Death Scale, and a Death Self-Efficacy Scale constructed for this research. Death anxiety significantly negatively correlated with four Personal Orientation Inventory scales, Coping with Death Scale positively correlated with seven of the twelve Personal Orientation Inventory Scales, and the Self-Efficacy Scale significantly correlated with eleven of them. These findings suggest that death competency constructs may be more useful than the concept of death anxiety in conceptualizing people’s emerging self-actualization in the process of confronting mortality.

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Notes on contributors

Rosemary A. Robbins

Rosemary A. Robbins, PhD, is Clinical Psychologist and Assistant Professor of Psychology, Department of Anesthesia, The Milton S. Hershey Medical Center.