Loss and human resilience

Abstract In this article we argue that humans are more resilient in the face of loss than has been previously believed. We begin by showing that historically the bereavement literature has tended to pathologize what are otherwise normal and natural reactions to loss. We then introduce a characterization of resilience during bereavement as the ability to maintain continuity in identity from pre- to postloss. We review various types of evidence consistent with this proposal, with a particular emphasis on the relationship between resilience and continuity in social identity. We then explore four possible mechanisms by which resilient individuals achieve identity continuity. We also attempt to extend the resilience-as-continuity link to the recent literature on continued bonds with the deceased and explore how this link manifests across different cultures. Finally, we review some implications of these formulations for psychotherapy with bereaved individuals.

[1]  L. Alloy,et al.  Dysphoria and social interaction: an integration of behavorial confirmation and interpersonal perspectives. , 1998, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[2]  Symptomatology and management of acute grief , 1944 .

[3]  G. Bonanno,et al.  The varieties of grief experience. , 2001, Clinical psychology review.

[4]  G. Bonanno.  The crucial importance of empirical evidence in the development of bereavement theory: reply to Archer (2001). , 2001, Psychological bulletin.

[5]  S. Jacobs.  Pathologic grief: Maladaptation to loss. , 1993 .

[6]  M. Horowitz.  Stress response syndromes , 1976 .

[7]  J. Hokanson,et al.  Conversational and social responses to depressive interpersonal behavior. , 1979, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[8]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Illusion and well-being: a social psychological perspective on mental health. , 1988, Psychological bulletin.

[9]  E. Higgins,et al.  Self-discrepancy: a theory relating self and affect. , 1987, Psychological review.

[10]  Shelley E. Taylor.  Adjustment to threatening events: A theory of cognitive adaptation. , 1983 .

[11]  U. Dimberg,et al.  Unconscious Facial Reactions to Emotional Facial Expressions , 2000, Psychological science.

[12]  L. King,et al.  Writing about the Perceived Benefits of Traumatic Events: Implications for Physical Health , 2000 .

[13]  B. Raphael.  The anatomy of bereavement , 1983 .

[14]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Examining the Delayed Grief Hypothesis Across 5 Years of Bereavement , 2001 .

[15]  H. Schut,et al.  The dual process model of coping with bereavement: rationale and description. , 1999, Death studies.

[16]  T. A. Rando.  The Increasing Prevalence of Complicated Mourning: The Onslaught is Just Beginning , 1993 .

[17]  D. Kupfer,et al.  Complicated grief and bereavement-related depression as distinct disorders: preliminary empirical validation in elderly bereaved spouses. , 1995, The American journal of psychiatry.

[18]  Craig A. Smith,et al.  From appraisal to emotion: Differences among unpleasant feelings , 1988 .

[19]  W. Sacco,et al.  A social-cognitive model of interpersonal processes in depression , 1999 .

[20]  K. Deaux,et al.  Relationship between social and personal identities: Segregation or integration. , 1996 .

[21]  K. Rook,et al.  Social Support Measurement and Interventions , 2000 .

[22]  D. McAdams,et al.  Power, Intimacy and the Life Story: Personological Inquiries into Identity , 1985 .

[23]  M. Rothbart,et al.  International Perspectives on Human Development. , 1978 .

[24]  Therese A. Rando,et al.  Treatment of complicated mourning , 1993 .

[25]  W. Stroebe,et al.  Does ‘grief work’ work? , 1991, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[26]  Invisible support and adjustment to stress. , 2000 .

[27]  A. Greenwald.  The totalitarian ego: Fabrication and revision of personal history. , 1980 .

[28]  W. Stroebe,et al.  Handbook of bereavement research , 2001 .

[29]  R. C. Silver,et al.  The myths of coping with loss. , 1989, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[30]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Toward an integrative perspective on bereavement. , 1999, Psychological bulletin.

[31]  D. Paulhus.  Measurement and control of response bias. , 1991 .

[32]  J. E. HUMBLE,et al.  The meaning of life , 2013, Nature.

[33]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Doing and being well (for the most part): adaptive patterns of narrative self-evaluation during bereavement. , 2001, Journal of personality.

[34]  H. Deutsch,et al.  Absence of Grief , 1937 .

[35]  Peter Salovey,et al.  The Remembered Self: Emotion and Memory in Personality , 1993 .

[36]  Nancy Cantor,et al.  From thought to behavior: "Having" and "doing" in the study of personality and cognition. , 1990 .

[37]  G. Metalsky,et al.  A prospective test of an integrative interpersonal theory of depression: a naturalistic study of college roommates. , 1995, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[38]  John P. Robinson,et al.  Measures Of Personality And Social Psychological Attitudes , 1991 .

[39]  B. Raphael,et al.  An International Perspective on Bereavement Related Concepts , 1993, The Australian and New Zealand journal of psychiatry.

[40]  W. Stroebe,et al.  The role of loneliness and social support in adjustment to loss: a test of attachment versus stress theory. , 1996, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[41]  Christopher G. Davis,et al.  Loss and Meaning , 2001 .

[42]  C. Izard,et al.  Four systems for emotion activation: cognitive and noncognitive processes. , 1993, Psychological review.

[43]  R. Lazarus.  Emotion and Adaptation , 1991 .

[44]  G. Bonanno,et al.  The Core Emotion Themes of Conjugal Loss , 1999 .

[45]  Delroy L. Paulhus,et al.  Enhancement and Denial in Socially Desirable Responding , 1991 .

[46]  Martha E. Francis,et al.  Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Linguistic Predictors of Adaptive Bereavement , 2022 .

[47]  P. Ekman.  An argument for basic emotions , 1992 .

[48]  Sigmund Freud,et al.  Mourning and Melancholia , 1922 .

[49]  N. Eisenberg,et al.  Coping with Stress , 1997 .

[50]  W. Stroebe,et al.  Handbook of bereavement research: Consequences, coping, and care , 2001 .

[51]  J. House,et al.  Social relationships and health. , 1988, Science.

[52]  Morris B. Green,et al.  Bereavement : reactions, consequences, and care , 1985 .

[53]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Continuity amid discontinuity: Bridging one's past and present in stories of conjugal bereavement. , 2001 .

[54]  S. Zisook,et al.  The course of normal grief. , 1993 .

[55]  Robert S. Weiss,et al.  Grief, bonds, and relationships. , 2001 .

[56]  Nancy Cantor,et al.  Personal construal of life tasks: Those who struggle for independence , 1990 .

[57]  D. Herman.  Narrative Theory and the Cognitive Sciences , 2001 .

[58]  R. Neimeyer.  Reauthoring life narratives: grief therapy as meaning reconstruction. , 2001, The Israel journal of psychiatry and related sciences.

[59]  When avoiding unpleasant emotions might not be such a bad thing: Verbal-autonomic response dissociation and midlife conjugal bereavement. , 1995 .

[60]  J. Coyne.  Depression and the response of others. , 1976, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[61]  Joshua M. Smyth,et al.  Written emotional expression : Effect sizes, outcome types, and moderating variables , 1998 .

[62]  D. Klass,et al.  Continuing Bonds : New Understandings of Grief , 1996 .

[63]  R. Neimeyer,et al.  Coping and coherence: A narrative perspective on resilience. , 2001 .

[64]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Social Comparisons and Adjustment Among Cardiac Patients1 , 1993 .

[65]  O. John,et al.  Accuracy and bias in self-perception: individual differences in self-enhancement and the role of narcissism. , 1994, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[66]  W. Stroebe,et al.  Bereavement and health: The psychological and physical consequences of partner loss. , 1987 .

[67]  E. Shapiro.  Family bereavement and cultural diversity: a social developmental perspective. , 1996, Family process.

[68]  S. Zisook,et al.  The many faces of depression following spousal bereavement. , 1997, Journal of affective disorders.

[69]  L. King,et al.  The Health Benefits of Writing about Life Goals , 2001 .

[70]  S. Nolen-Hoeksema,et al.  Rumination and psychological distress among bereaved partners. , 1997, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[71]  S. Freud.  The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud , 1953 .

[72]  C. Zahn-Waxler,et al.  Emotional dysregulation in disruptive behavior disorders. , 1992 .

[73]  W. Stroebe,et al.  Handbook of Bereavement: Theory, Research and Intervention , 1993 .

[74]  P. Thoits.  Social support as coping assistance. , 1986, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[75]  C. Sanders.  Risk Factors in Bereavement Outcome , 1988 .

[76]  D. Irish,et al.  Ethnic variations in dying, death, and grief: Diversity in universality. , 1993 .

[77]  A. Holen,et al.  The relation of continuing attachment to adjustment in conjugal bereavement. , 1999, Journal of consulting and clinical psychology.

[78]  J. Bowlby.  Attachment and loss: retrospect and prospect. , 1969, The American journal of orthopsychiatry.

[79]  B. Raphael,et al.  The Bereavement Response: A Cluster Analysis , 1996, British Journal of Psychiatry.

[80]  N. Bolger,et al.  Social relationships, personality, and anxiety during a major stressful event. , 1991, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[81]  D. Paulhus.  Interpersonal and intrapsychic adaptiveness of trait self-enhancement: a mixed blessing? , 1998, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[82]  S. Jacobs,et al.  Pathologic grief and its relationship to other psychiatric disorders. , 1991, Journal of affective disorders.

[83]  G. Bonanno.  Introduction: New Directions in Bereavement Research and Theory , 2001 .

[84]  Thomas E. Joiner,et al.  The interactional nature of depression: Advances in interpersonal approaches. , 1999 .

[85]  R. Neimeyer.  SEARCHING FOR THE MEANING OF MEANING: GRIEF THERAPY AND THE PROCESS OF RECONSTRUCTION , 2000, Death studies.

[86]  L. F. Barrett,et al.  Handbook of Emotions , 1993 .

[87]  D. Funder,et al.  Overly positive self-evaluations and personality: negative implications for mental health. , 1995, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[88]  R. Weiss,et al.  Recovery from bereavement , 1983 .

[89]  D. Klass.  Continuing Bonds in the Resolution of Grief in Japan and North America , 2001 .

[90]  J. Archer,et al.  Broad and narrow perspectives in grief theory: comment on Bonanno and Kaltman (1999). , 2001, Psychological bulletin.

[91]  John Bowlby,et al.  Loss--Sadness and Depression , 1980 .

[92]  J. Coyne,et al.  Social confirmation of dysphoria: shared and private reactions to depression. , 1983, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[93]  P. Ellsworth,et al.  Beyond simple pessimism: effects of sadness and anger on social perception. , 1993, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[94]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Positive illusions and well-being revisited: separating fact from fiction. , 1994, Psychological bulletin.

[95]  D. McAdams.  The Stories We Live By: Personal Myths and the Making of the Self , 1997 .

[96]  A. Stone,et al.  Emotional expression and physical health: revising traumatic memories or fostering self-regulation? , 1996, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[97]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Self-Enhancement as a Buffer Against Extreme Adversity: Civil War in Bosnia and Traumatic Loss in the United States , 2002 .

[98]  J. V. Wood,et al.  It Could Be Worse: Selective Evaluation as a Response to Victimization , 1983 .

[99]  Shelley E. Taylor,et al.  Assault on the Self: Positive Illusions and Adjustment to Threatening Events , 1991 .

[100]  R. Janoff-Bulman.  Shattered Assumptions: Towards a New Psychology of Trauma , 1992 .

[101]  R. C. Silver,et al.  The myths of coping with loss revisited. , 2001 .

[102]  G. Bonanno,et al.  Facial expressions of emotion and the course of conjugal bereavement. , 1997, Journal of abnormal psychology.

[103]  P. Marris,et al.  Widows and their families , 1959 .

[104]  G. Bonanno,et al.  A Study of Laughter and Dissociation: Distinct Correlates of Laughter and Smiling During Bereavement , 1997 .

[105]  S. Zisook,et al.  PTSD Following Bereavement , 1998, Annals of clinical psychiatry : official journal of the American Academy of Clinical Psychiatrists.

[106]  J. Worden,et al.  Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy: A Handbook for the Mental Health Practitioner , 1991 .

[107]  D. Cicchetti,et al.  Developmental perspectives on depression , 1992 .

[108]  R. Kalish.  Death and Dying , 1980, The Dying Patient.

[109]  Joan W. Moore.  The Death Culture of Mexico and Mexican—Americans , 1971 .