Social, cognitive and emotional strategies in the grief process


Tezin Türü: Doktora

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Eğitim Fakültesi, Eğitim Bilimleri Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2015

Öğrenci: İDİL AKSÖZ EFE

Danışman: ÖZGÜR ERDUR BAKER

Özet:

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of meta-mood processes, emotion regulation strategies, ruminative responses and perceptions of social constraints of bereaved individuals on their grief process. The sample of the study consisted of 708 bereaved adults, who had an experience of loss in the last five years. The Two-Track Model of Bereavement Questionnaire, Social Constraints Scale, Trait Meta-Mood Scale, Ruminative Responses Scale and Emotion Regulation Questionnaire were administered in the study with a demographic form. Traumatic perception of death was eliminated from the study because of the high multicollinearity values, thus close and positive relationship with the deceased and conflictual relationship with the deceased were the grief related endogenous variables, while relational active grieving and biopsychosocial functioning were the exogenous variable of the study. SEM results revealed that bereaved individuals who had lower abilities in repairing their mood, higher levels of ruminative responses, and higher perceptions of social constraints had higher scores on relational active grieving. Also, bereaved individuals who had lower abilities in repairing their mood, lower levels of reappraising the situation, higher levels of ruminative responses, and higher perceptions of social constraints had also higher scores on biopsychosocial functioning. Overall, the results supported the hypothesized model and showed that social, emotional and cognitive backgrounds of the bereaved individuals influence their process of adaptation to the loss. In the light of the relevant literature, findings were discussed and implications for practice and research and recommendations for the further studies were presented.