Individual and Psychosocial Mechanisms of Adaptive Functioning in Parentally Bereaved Children

ABSTRACT

The authors examined factors theorized to contribute to adaptive functioning in 56 parentally bereaved children (age 7–13) who had lost their caregiver within the previous 6 months. Adaptive functioning, defined as falling below clinical threshold levels on all measures of depression, posttraumatic stress, anxiety, and internalizing/externalizing symptoms, characterized 57% of the sample. Linear mixed modeling revealed that children in the adaptive functioning group had lower mean scores on avoidant coping and higher mean scores on coping efficacy, religiosity, parental positive reinforcement, and parental empathy. Findings suggest that adaptive functioning following parental loss is related to both child-intrinsic factors and child-extrinsic factors.

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank Michelle Belke, Alena Grieser, Heather Hammerstrom, Harriett Jones, Georgia Stamatopoulos, and Amanda Tarantowski for their assistance with conducting interviews. We also thank Britney Wardecker, Emilie Lerner, and Amanda Burnside for their assistance with project coordination. We greatly appreciate the help of Damia December, Valerie Elsesser, Joanna Gross, Kara Koppinger, Mirele Mann, Meredith Merlanti, Michael Shain, Jerri Bamberger, Monica Arkin, Maggie O'Reilly Treter, Megan Ramthun, and Madison Kraus for their assistance with data management and data entry. Finally, we wish to acknowledge the Gilda's Club of Grand Rapids staff for their administrative support, and all participating children, parents, and guardians.