The Many Faces of Grief: A Systematic Literature Review of Grief During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Ritesh M Kumar

doi:10.1177/10541373211038084

Ritesh M Kumar

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1177/10541373211038084

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Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has halted life all around the world. The disease, along with quarantine, social distancing, unemployment, and displacement, has led to myriad losses. There is a rising concern for the epidemic of grief that can result from these multiple losses. The present study aimed to investigate how grief is understood and discussed in the extant literature during the COVID pandemic. A systematic literature review was conducted using PsycArticles, Web of Science, and Scopus databases. The qualitative synthesis of 33 articles indicates that grief can be manifested at various levels such as grief for self, relational grief, collective grief, and ecological grief. Another theme emphasizes some of the factors that could intensify the grief process leading to prolonged grief disorder. A third theme relates to the focus of grief processes as experienced by individuals in different developmental periods from childhood to senescence. The study contributes theoretically by expanding our perception and understanding of varied forms of grief.

Highlights

The novel coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), first identified in Wuhan, of China, has spread around the world like a wildfire
We employed thematic analysis to identify the major themes discussed by authors in the extant literature
Authors have written about different forms of grief that can be organized at different levels

Summary

Introduction

The novel coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19), first identified in Wuhan, of China, has spread around the world like a wildfire. The pandemic has resulted in the deaths of millions of people. It has impacted the lives of nearly everyone in some way or another. As the world quarantined itself, many people lost their employment and livelihood opportunities; at many places, hospitals turned their backs to non-COVID illnesses (Hamid & Jahangir, 2020); industries, schools, universities, and transport systems were shut down to contain the spreading infection. All of these resulted in losses and, grief responses that affected the physical and psychological health of the individuals

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