This study was undertaken to construct a brief, reliable, and valid questionnaire for measuring attitudes toward death and dying. In Stage 1, four groups of individuals ranging in age from 30 to 82 years completed the Death Anxiety Questionnaire (DAQ), a brief anxiety scale (MAS), and a depression scale (DP). During Stage 2, results on these scales were cross-validated on a new sample of subjects, and the Templer and Dickstein measures of death anxiety were also completed. Internal consistency of the DAQ as determined by coefficient alpha was .83 (n = 230) and test-retest reliability was .87 (n = 30). No significant sex or age differences were found for any of the groups tested. Results provided evidence for both construct and concurrent validity of the DAQ and for discriminant validity of the items. A principal-components factor analysis suggested four independent dimensions of death anxiety: Fear of the Unknown; Fear of Suffering; Fear of Loneliness; and Fear of Personal Extinction. Recommendations for future research include an investigation of the degree to which scores on these four dimensions might differentiate among different sex, age, personality, affective, and diagnostic groupings.

http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/43/4/775.pdf

Measuring Death Anxiety: Conceptual, Psychometric, and Factor-Analytic Aspects

Old People in Three Industrial Societies

The impact of a workshop on death and dying on death anxiety, life satisfaction, and locus of control was determined for a self-selected group of middle-aged and older adults in the state of North Carolina. In addition, 27 personal and situational characteristics of respondents were investigated to determine their impact on pretest levels of each of the dependent variables. The t test revealed a small but significant decrease in death anxiety in the experimental group. There was no significant change in the control group. Changes in life satisfaction and locus of control were positive but nonsignificant. The results of the least squares means analysis indicated that the variables selected for examination in the study accounted for 70, 47, and 36 percent of the variance in pretest death anxiety, life satisfaction, and locus of control scores, respectively.

The Impact of a Workshop on Death and Dying on Death Anxiety, Life Satisfaction, and Locus of Control among Middle-Aged and Older Adults.

The Biological, Sociological and Psychological Aspects of Aging

노인의 주관적 건강상태, 종교성과 죽음에 대한 공포

The present study examines the effects of contemporaneous circumstances on the death attitudes of older adults. Three causal models “explaining” death attitudes were formulated by abstracting relev...

Constance T. Batterson

Papers

The Death Attitudes of Older Adults: A Path-Analytical Exploration