Personal Fear of Death and Grief in Bereaved Mothers

Abstract

The study explored the relation of fear of death (Multidimensional Fear of Death Scale) to maternal grief (Perinatal Grief Scale-33) following miscarriage, stillbirth, neonatal death, or infant/child death. The 400 women participants were recruited from the website, e-mail lists, and parent groups of an organization that supports bereaved parents. Fear of death had a statistically significant relation with maternal grief. Fear of the Unknown, Fear of Premature Death, and Fear of Conscious Death made significant unique contributions to the variance in maternal grief. The fear of death operative in maternal grief seems to be the fear of personal extinction.