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Abstract
In the current study, the authors expanded on a program of qualitative inquiry exploring final conversations (FCs) to the understudied population of children/adolescents. Participants were 61 children/adolescents aged 5–18, who participated in semi-structured interviews regarding their FCs with a dying family member. Inductive coding analysis led the authors to discover four overarching themes of children/adolescents’ FCs messages, in order of descending prominence, are: everyday communication, messages of love, messages of individual identity, and messages related to religion/spirituality. The authors applied Functional Theory to further delineate how participants used, and continue to use, the messages from each theme within their FCs. Discussion of results, including limitations and directions for further research, is outlined.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In addition, the authors would like to thank the children and counselors of Camp El Tesoro de la Vida, Camp Courageous (John Newcombe), and Hospice of the Western Reserve for their help with participating in this research.
FUNDING
The authors would like to thank Texas State University – San Marcos for support of this research through their Research Enhancement Grant Program.