Mourning in Japan

Yamamoto, Joe; Okonogi, Keigo; Iwasaki, T; Yoshimura, Saburo

doi:10.1176/ajp.125.12.1660

Cited by 100 publications

(61 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…It was like my father had heard that and he was so excited that I had said that.' (Antonia) Being able to affect the deceased loved one may be indicative of a more symmetrical relationship, similar to the co-dependency held to characterize relationships between the living and their ancestors in contexts such as Japan (Klass & Goss 1999;Yamamoto et al, 1969). It entails a certain responsibility, expressed by Yvonne when saying about her husband's deceased daughter, 'She's happy, but she's got to be sad when she looks down and sees him when he's so sad'.…”

Section: Mutuality Of the Relationshipmentioning

confidence: 88%

“…Building on cross-cultural findings (e.g. Yamamoto, Okonogi, Iwasaki & Yoshimura, 1969), the 'continuing bonds' perspective (Klass, Silverman & Nickman, 1996) has shown that such experiences can be seen as normal events within the ongoing relationship with the deceased and can be conceptualized within spiritual and religious frameworks. This may be more difficult in a Western context, challenging traditional assumptions about the duality of the material and non-material worlds (Bennett & Bennett, 2000) and life and death (Rosenblatt, 1997).…”

Section: Sense Of Presence Experiences and Meaning-making In Bereavemmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sense of Presence Experiences and Meaning-Making in Bereavement: A Qualitative Analysis

Steffen¹,

Coyle²

2011

Death Studies

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Acknowledgements:We would like to extend our sincere thanks to two anonymous reviewers and to Robert A. Neimeyer and Nigel Field for their invaluable and insightful advice and support in helping us to develop this article for publication.1 Address correspondence to Edith Steffen, Department of Psychology, University of Surrey, Guildford, Surrey, GU2 7XH, United Kingdom. E-mail: e.steffen@surrey.ac.uk, Tel.: +44 (0)1483 689553 Keywords: bereavement; continuing bonds; meaning-making; post-traumatic growth; sense of presence; spirituality Bereavement has been described as a major life crisis with potentially severe effects on the survivor's physical and psychological well-being (Lindemann, 1944;Parkes, 1970Parkes, , 1996. 2 SENSE OF PRESENCE EXPERIENCES AND MEANING-MAKING IN BEREAVEMENT: A QUALITATIVE ANALYSISFor much of the twentieth century, Western approaches to bereavement have emphasized emotional disengagement from the deceased and the 'working-through' of grief (Freud, 3 1917). Following increasing challenges to this 'grief work' paradigm (e.g. Wortman & Silver, 1989), a new strand of bereavement research has started to identify positive effects of bereavement under the categories of coping (e.g. Folkman, 2001) and post-traumatic growth .Linking bereavement research with research into post-traumatic cognitive processes has drawn attention to the significance of post-bereavement 'meaning-making'. According to Janoff-Bulman (1992), major trauma can shatter people's 'assumptive world' with regard to core beliefs about the benevolence and meaningfulness of the world and one's self-worth.Such 'existential trauma' (Benore & Park, 2004) can lead to a 'search for meaning ' (Frankl, 1959;) ,with the goal of integrating the loss into the assumptive worldview or 'self-narrative' (Neimeyer, 2001) through meaning reconstruction processes such as sense-making, benefitfinding, and identity change (Neimeyer, 2006).Religious and spiritual beliefs can aid these processes (Davis, Nolen-Hoeksema & Larson, 1998), and the potentially positive role of religion in bereavement has been observed (e.g. Becker et al., 2007;Golsworthy & Coyle, 1999;Wortman & Park, 2008). However, a major loss can also challenge existing religious beliefs or lead to a (re-)discovery of faith and spiritual change (Balk, 1999). Spiritual experiences in bereavement may play a significant role here. Benore and Park (2004) 1996) and is generally perceived as 'comforting' (e.g. Parkes, 1970;Sormanti & August, 1997), 'pleasant' (Grimby, 1998;), and helpful or positive (e.g. Chan et al., 2005;LaGrand, 1997). Sometimes, though, sense-of-presence experiences are perceived as negative; for example, Tyson-Rawson (1996) noted that an 'unwelcome' or 'intrusive presence' is often linked with 'unfinished business' in the relationship with the deceased. Although the reported percentages of negative experiences are small compared to positive ones, e.g. 6% and 69% respectively by Rees (1971Rees ( , 2001) and 14% and 86% respectively by Datson and Marwit (1997), di...

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Section: Mutuality Of the Relationshipmentioning

confidence: 88%

Section: Sense Of Presence Experiences and Meaning-making In Bereavemmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sense of Presence Experiences and Meaning-Making in Bereavement: A Qualitative Analysis

Steffen¹,

Coyle²

2011

Death Studies

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“…The bereaved may have a variety of ADC experiences, including experiencing a presence, dreams, odors, voices, and "meaningfully timed appearances of animals, rainbows, and other symbolic natural phenomenon" (Kwilecki 2011:220). Since the 1960s, several researchers have investigated ADC, including Ress (1971) and Yamamoto et al (1969) whose research found ADCs to be common and helpful experiences for the bereaved. Klass (1993Klass ( , 1996, Silverman & Klass (1996), and Botkin and Hogan's (2005) research suggested that ADCs might contribute to continuing bonds with the deceased.…”

Section: After-death Communicationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mourning 2.0—Continuing Bonds Between the Living and the Dead on Facebook

Irwin

2015

Omega (Westport)

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This study examines the burgeoning phenomenon of Facebook memorial pages and how this research about online social networking environments can contribute to the existing literature related to Klass, Silverman, and Nickman (1996) continuing bonds thesis. I argue that memorial pages constitute a new ritualized and public space for maintaining these continued bonds and that individuals exhibit several types of bonding interactions with the deceased. I conducted a content analysis on a purposively selected sample of 12 public Facebook “pages” where I coded 1,270 individual Wall postings. Analyses demonstrated that many individuals routinely used these Walls to continue their relationships with the deceased. Findings revealed several Wall posting categories, “guidance from beyond and reunion with the deceased,” “messages and visitations from the deceased,” and “conversations with the deceased,” which I then combined under a central thematic heading of “paranormal copresence.” There were 267 Wall postings coded under “guidance and reunion,” 26 for “messages and visitations,” and 340 for “conversations,” with the total of 633 Wall postings under the central thematic heading of paranormal copresence. This research highlights how individuals have transcended the limitations of time and physical space in relation to traditional bereavement behavior and rituals and how data found on public websites, such as Facebook, can be used to further theorize bereavement and to demonstrate continue bonds between the living and the dead.

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“…An early and oft-quoted example is a study by Yamamto, Okonogi, Iwasaki and Yoshimura (1969) in which Japanese widows' ongoing relationships with the deceased (which included sense of presence experiences for 18 out of 20 participants) were shown to be part of normal grief processes and could be conceptualised within a religious framework derived from Shintoism and Buddhism. It was noted that six of the widows had no religious affiliation but that four of those nevertheless adhered to religious practices such as keeping an altar for the deceased.…”

Section: A Socio-cultural Perspectivementioning

confidence: 99%

“…One might surmise that the lack of a sanctioning religious community for non-affiliated but practising Japanese widows was possibly 13 compensated for by a cultural sanctioning on the part of the wider community. However, it could be argued that the cultural sanctioning referred to in the study by Yamamoto et al (1969) was still based on religious principles rather than on secular ones such as tolerance or respect for individual choices. This would indicate that the outwardly nonreligious widows, who were shown to benefit from sense of presence experiences, nevertheless conceptualised the phenomena along spiritual lines and that this may have contributed to the adaptive value of the experience.…”

Section: A Socio-cultural Perspectivementioning

confidence: 99%

Can “sense of presence” experiences in bereavement be conceptualised as spiritual phenomena?

Steffen

Coyle

2010

Mental Health, Religion & Culture

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Can "sense of presence" experiences in bereavement be conceptualised as spiritual phenomena?This paper explores the possibility of conceptualising the frequently occurring experience of "sensing the presence of the deceased" in bereavement as a spiritual phenomenon and examines how such a conceptualisation can be related to two recent perspectives in the field of bereavement research, "continuing bonds" and "meaning-making". It is argued that "sense of presence" experiences are expressions of the continuing relationship with the deceased that can be spiritually understood but that pose various challenges for their meaningful integration into the bereaved person's worldview or meaning structuressomething that may need to be more explicitly incorporated into current theoretical frameworks. It is suggested that these experiences can be the catalyst for "post-traumatic growth" through a socially mediated and interactive narrative exploration and that this has important implications for bereavement counselling and therapy.

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Mourning in Japan

Cited by 100 publications

References 2 publications

Sense of Presence Experiences and Meaning-Making in Bereavement: A Qualitative Analysis

Sense of Presence Experiences and Meaning-Making in Bereavement: A Qualitative Analysis

Mourning 2.0—Continuing Bonds Between the Living and the Dead on Facebook

Can “sense of presence” experiences in bereavement be conceptualised as spiritual phenomena?

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