This study examined the psychological and behavioral correlates of three major coping strategies used by medically ill patients in dealing with their illness; namely, confrontation, avoidance, and acceptance-resignation. The subjects consisted of 223 male medical patients with a variety of life-threatening and chronic illnesses. Coping responses were measured by the Medical Coping Modes Questionnaire, while other variables were tapped by a variety of self-report and test measures, as well as by interview data. Significant correlates were found for each of the coping strategies accounting for 10 to 53% of the variance. These included demographic, illness, and psychological variables. Employment of acceptance-resignation as a coping strategy was particularly evident in patients with little expectation of recovery and a lack of hope. Effectiveness of coping appeared to be negatively linked to frequent use of avoidance and acceptance-resignation in life-threatened patients. Overall, it seems that a variety of variables across several domains accompany the use of a particular coping strategy; that choice of a specific strategy is most likely multidetermined; and that the configuration of variables associated with a particular strategy is likely to be different for each coping strategy. Coping behavior is a subtle, multifashioned expression the complete grasp of which demands an integrative approach.

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The study focused on selecting major demographic variables (including personal nearness to death and recent experience with death) significantly related to fear of personal death. Use was made of a multilevel criterion to study 371 persons, encompassing physically ill and emotionally disturbed patients and healthy individuals. Age and religious self-rating were the only two predictor variables found to be consistently associated with personal fear. The configurational profile emerging from analysis of the three levels used suggested the coexistence of an acceptance-avoidance approach toward the notion of personal death.

This study analyzed the perceptions of both patients and their psychotherapists at the close of psychotherapy as to changes taking place and ideas about what was helpful and not helpful. The participants consisted of 63 outpatients and 28 psychotherapists. Data were secured by administering an open-end questionnaire. Major findings and conclusions were: (a) therapists stressed changes in symptomatic relief and improvement in social relationships, whereas patients focused on self-understanding and self-confidence; (b) patients underlined the opportunity to talk over problems and the "human" characteristics of the psychotherapist as helpful, and therapists highlighted therapeutic technique and support to the patient as most beneficial; (c) expectancy and conceptual disparities about therapy between patient and therapist should be minded to maximize treatment benefits.

The place of death in psychology is reviewed historically. Leading causes for its being slighted as an area of investigation during psychology's early years are presented. Reasons for its rediscovery in the mid-1950s as a legitimate sector for scientific inquiry are then discussed, along with some vicissitudes encountered in cartying out research in the field. This is followed by a description of principal empirical findings, clinical perceptions, and perspectives emerging from work in the thanatological realm. The probability that such urgent social issues as abortion, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), and euthanasia, and such destructive behaviors as drug abuse, alcoholism, and certain acts of violence are associated with attitudes toward death offers a challenge to psychology to enhance the vitality of human response to maladaptive conduct and loss. Recognition of personal mortality is a major enttyway to self-knowledge. Although death is manifestly too complex to be the special sphere of any one discipline, psychology's position as an arena in which humanist and physicist-engineer cultures intersect provides us with a meaningful opportunity to advance our comprehension of how death can serve life.