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The Relational Injury of Paternal Loss: An Exploration of Grief Using Experiential Personal Construct Psychology

Gaffney, Joel Scott
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0233-8836
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1500650428556315

Abstract Details

2017, Doctor of Philosophy, Miami University, Psychology.
During the past two decades, researchers have found that grievers making sense of their losses experience less distress (Gillies & Neimeyer, 2015; Neimeyer, 2000). Others also have found that grievers’ engaging in relationships with the deceased can experience benefit (Klass, Silverman & Nickman, 1996). However, researchers have not explored grievers’ navigation of post-loss relationships with living people as a potential predictor of their grief distress. Leitner (1985) described ROLE relating (the intimate mutual construing of meaning making between two people) as a central process in human life. As such, it seems likely grievers’ ROLE relationships are integral in post-loss lives, including their meaning reconstruction (the process of making sense of life after loss). I conducted qualitative interviews in which I assessed grievers’ meaning reconstruction, continuing bonds relationships (relationships with deceased people after they die), and navigation of deep, interpersonal relationships with living people in four sons who lost their fathers. In addition, I used the Inventory of Complicated Grief (Prigerson et al., 1996) as a quantitative indicator of grievers’ distress. Grievers’ meaning reconstruction and engagement in continuing bonds did not reliably correspond with their levels of distress. However, when they experienced close connection with another person, particularly in allowing another to understand their experiences of loss, they invariably benefited. I will highlight important research and clinical implications in my discussion of these results.
Larry Leitner, PhD (Advisor)
Vaishali Raval, PhD (Committee Member)
Ann Fuehrer, PhD (Committee Member)
Cameron Hay-Rollins, PhD (Committee Member)
217 p.
Clinical Psychology
Grief; Bereavement; Experiential Personal Construct Psychology; Meaning Reconstruction; Continuing Bonds

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Gaffney, J. S. (2017). The Relational Injury of Paternal Loss: An Exploration of Grief Using Experiential Personal Construct Psychology [Doctoral dissertation, Miami University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1500650428556315

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Gaffney, Joel. The Relational Injury of Paternal Loss: An Exploration of Grief Using Experiential Personal Construct Psychology. 2017. Miami University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1500650428556315.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Gaffney, Joel. "The Relational Injury of Paternal Loss: An Exploration of Grief Using Experiential Personal Construct Psychology." Doctoral dissertation, Miami University, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=miami1500650428556315

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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© 2017, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Miami University and OhioLINK.