DEATH PERSONIFICATION IN THE KEVORKIAN ERA

Abstract

Have death personifications changed over the past quarter of a century? A 1971 study explored the death personifications of college students, student nurses, nurses, and mortuary science students. The present study focused on 123 students of nursing and 324 students enrolled in general study courses at a large university in the American Southwest. The study also explored the possibilitythat Dr. Jack Kevorkian may have emerged as a contemporary image of death. Respondents were asked to imagine death as a character in the movies and to indicate the nature of this character through fixed-choice alternatives. Respondents were also asked to identify the sources or models for their personifications of death. It was found that male personifications of death still predominate, but that female personifications occur with greater frequency than in the earlier study, especially among female respondents. Although the "Gentle Comforter" is most often seen as an elderly person, overall the relationship between age and death personification appears to have weakened. There is now a larger divergence between the sexes in type of death personification selected most frequently. Females most often select "kind and gentle" imagery; males now are more likely to see death as a "cold, remote" person. Grim and terrifying images of death occur with some frequency, but are the least often selected by respondents of either sex. There was no evidence to support the emergence of a Kevorkian-type death personification, although he was identified correctly by almost all respondents and was viewed favorably by a majority.