Drawing upon extensive interviews and assessments of school-age children who have lost a parent to death, this book offers a richly textured portrait of the mourning process in children. The volume presents major findings from the Child Bereavement Study and places them in the context of previous research, shedding new light on both the wide range of normal variation in children's experience of grief and the factors that put bereaved children at risk. The book also compares parentally bereaved children with those who have suffered loss of a sibling to death, or of a parent through divorce, exploring similarities and differences in these experiences of loss. A concluding section explores the clinical implications of the findings and includes a review of intervention models and activities, as well as a screening instrument designed to help identify high-risk bereaved children.
Introduction
I. Children and Their Families in Mourning
1. The Mourning Process for Children
2. When a Parent Dies
3. How Life Changes
4. How the Child Responds
5. Mediators of the Child's Bereavement Experience
6. Children at Risk
II. Comparative Losses
7. When a Sibling Dies
8. The Loss of a Parent by Divorce
III. How We Can Help Bereaved Children
9. Counseling and Intervention Issues
10. Intervention Models and Activities
Epilogue
Appendix A: Project Assessment Instruments
Appendix B: Screening Instrument and Scoring Instructions
