Content Analysis of Free-Response Narratives to Personal Meanings of Death among Chinese Children and Adolescents

The study explores development of the concept of death among 204 Chinese children and adolescents and analyzes the relationships between death concept development and background variables. A coding manual for content analysis of death constructs adapted from R. A. Neimeyer et al. (1983) was used to classify each construct in the paragraphs written by participants regarding their views of death. The 6 categories most frequently identified were Internal Causality, Negative Emotion State, External Causality, Nonexistence, Negative Body State, and Existence. Death-related experiences did not significantly influence concepts regarding death, while significant differences emerged as a function of grade, gender, religion, and family death discussion for several death constructs. Compared with earlier American samples, Chinese children and adolescents identified less with choice and purposeful death constructs and were less likely to view death in terms of personal choice and morals or in terms of psychological or natural meaning. Whether the differences were due to cultural, methodological or age factors deserves further study. Finally, this study concludes with some recommendations for the future study of death constructs.

We thank the editor, Dr. Neimeyer, for his comments on our use of English and his substantive suggestions on the manuscript.

Notes

Note. 1 indicating those who with no religious belief; 2 indicating those with folk religion; 3 indicating those with western religion; 4 indicating others.

Note. 1 indicates open discussions, 2 indicates avoidance of discussing death, 3 indicates no talk about death.