Attitudes towards Death and Dying Analysis

Analysis of Attitudes towards Death and Dying
Death is an inevitable process that has to come with aging. As a person ages, they become more aware of this universal truth that he has to leave this world, and nothing would remain of him. He starts taking life from a different perspective and thinks of ways how he could be of benefit to others who he leaves behind. Some of the older people start thinking about their will, and some start preparing themselves for death if they are sick. This paper aims to reflect upon a person's ideas about grief, bereavement, and mourning from a psychological perspective and the difference of death anxiety with age and gender. In further sections, cultural and religious thoughts and their impact on a person's attitudes towards life would be discussed. 
Difference between Bereavement, Grief, and Mourning in Psychological Terms 
From a psychological perspective, bereavement refers to facing the sad incident of losing someone close (Shear, 2012). Grief is the response of a person's psychological experiences after losing that someone close in the form of sadness, yearning, and memories of the lost one. Mourning is a set of psychological processes that occur in response to grief to counter the gloomy thoughts, and reorientation to the real world could be settled. 
There is a strong relationship between the person who lost his loved one and the person who died. The grief becomes more intense based on the strength of the reaction. Various studies have revealed that grief is the most intense during a child's loss for a parent or when a life partner is gone. There is also a risk of depression and anxiety involved in those who bereave. It is a common conception that such grief is normal since a parent or anyone who has lost a close one experiences bereavement for a certain time, for instance, a year. Then he or she manages to adjust to the usual routine of daily lives and the environment. However, if the bereavement symptoms persist, the bereaving person can fall ill or fall victim to mental disorders like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), panic disorder, or major depression. 
As mentioned earlier, grief is the psychological response to bereavement when the brain starts playing previous memories and thoughts related to the deceased one. The yearning relative finds the inner world of thoughts and sadness more indulging than the outer world's activities; therefore, he keeps himself engrossed within his world of images and reflections, showing repulsion towards the ordinary life. This can also be inferred as acute grief. The bereaving person accepts the certainty of his loss, and re-imagining a prospect of happiness and contentment remains distant to him. 
Mourning is the psychological process in which the bereaving person tries to adjust himself back into the normal routine life after his loves one is lost. The emotional regulation and awareness can be defined in clinical terms of this process. It can be deduced that it is the systematic acceptance of a future without the deceased relative and reverting to the normal life without him. The bereaving person tried to reconnect with others and gain happiness in daily activities by finding his future potential. This methodical transformation is an integration of the grief since the emotional regulation of new erudition and accommodation in long-term remembrance occurs. 
Differing of Death Anxiety with Age and Gender
Age and gender react differently towards death anxiety, which means they do affect this psychological emotionality.  A study showed that age was the anticipator of death anxiety among women compared to men (Assari & Lankarani, 2016). When women progressed with age, they became more fearful of death in comparison to men. Further studies have identified that older women having illnesses of various kinds displayed higher levels of death anxiety. Thus age does affect death anxiety.
Also, gender played its part in depicting levels of anxiety as well. The same study corroborated this fact since women had a higher correlation with death anxiety compared to men. Men conceptualized this phenomenon as feminine as men found themselves braver in this context. This was also deduced due to the language and expressive differences between these two genders, as females are more expressive and blunt about their feelings at that very moment. In contrast, men do not express directly and do not want to show fear of death to avoid looking weaker. 
Cultural Difference in People's Response towards Death
Cultural differences were observed for the reaction towards death anxiety as well.  A study investigated death anxiety scores for undergraduate students of the United States and other nations (Lester, Templer & Abdel-Khalek, 2007). There were strong gender and cultural differences. The Death Anxiety Scale (D.A.S.) was used to measure the level of anxiety among these students. This scale used 15 items to be answered in true and false format.  Based on gender, the results revealed that women showed higher scores on the death anxiety scale, indicating greater fear of death than men. Moreover, Qatar females were on top of the list based on culture, showing greater signs of fear from death. India, Philippines, Syria, Kuwait, Egypt, Sudan, Korea, and Australia were all the other countries on the list according to their scores (from highest to lowest). 
There has been a great debate on cultural attitudes on euthanasia and assisted suicide. With the growing global attention on both of these concepts, researchers have shown interest in these topics and how people from distinct cultures respond. A study was conducted on the Austrian population to assess these two concepts (Stolz et al., 2015). The results indicated that rejection for euthanasia and physician-assisted death was varied across certain situations. A small section of the population approved these two types of deaths when the patient was suffering highly from ailments like cancer, especially due to old age. Men were seen to favor these two types of death practices, with abstract support of 43 to 48 percent of the population. Agreement towards these two concepts was lower where non-voluntary physician-assisted death was meant for severely disabled or ill individuals. Men again were seen to be advocating as compared to women in this scenario. 
In American culture, euthanasia and physician-assisted death are considered intense constructs since they give the individual the right to determine whether to live or die (Allen et al., 2006). From 1936 to 2002, the support towards these two notions increased since they thought if an individual is seriously ill and prolonging his life span by giving him medicines and enforcing him to live if he is not showing signs of betterment, it would be inflicting pain on him. Therefore, they thought his life should be ended with the help of a physician. However, from 1973 to 2002, several political, media, and religious interventions were made to decrease this support for ending one's life. American's moral beliefs were highlighted, and the media was activated for bringing down this crucial matter. 
The cultural reflections from a Malaysian context are entirely different since many Malaysian populations are against euthanasia and physician-assisted death (Rathor et al., 2014). They do not support illness-related death and are more adamant about their religious beliefs. Therefore they are extremely against these two concepts. It can be deduced that different cultures have different insights about deaths and taking one's own life, even if it is with a medical expert's assistance. 
Acceptance of Death in Religious and Spiritual Terms 
Religion's role in accepting death is significant since people close to religion accept death gracefully and have less death anxiety. This is verified by a study conducted to evaluate the relationship between religiosity, death acceptance, and death anxiety. The results showed that people who accept inevitably have less fear (Harding et al., 2005). There was also a negative correlation between death acceptance and death anxiety. Those who accepted death without any dread were witnessed having less anxiety. Also, having a strong faith in God and religion had significantly string results since the belief was strongly correlated to death acceptance and negatively correlated with death anxiety.
It should be noted that belief in God and death acceptance does not indicate any after-life belief. Religion is complex itself, and the way people have perceptions about God might reflect their opinions about life and death in certain cultures. Researchers need to be aware of this disparity since thoughtfulness needs to be put to practice when conducting a study on religious certainty and peoples' attitudes about death. 
Conclusion
When someone close dies, the closest relatives are greatly impacted by this loss since their mourning, grief, and bereavement influence his psychological proceedings meaningfully. Age and gender have been established to influence individuals' death anxiety, and for that, cultural and religious differences come into play as well. Death is an inevitable outcome that everyone has to face, either frightfully or bravely. 
References
Allen, J., Chavez, S., DeSimone, S., Howard, D. & Johnson, K. (2006). American's attitudes toward euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, 1936-2002. The Journal of Sociology and Social Welfare, 33(2), 5-23. Available at Scholar Works
Assari, S. & Lankarani, M.M. (2016). Race and gender differences in correlates of death anxiety among elderly in the United States. Iranian Journal of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, 10(2). e2024. DOI: 10.17795/ijpbs-2024
Harding, S.R., Flanelly, K.J., Weaver, A.J. & Costa, K, G. (2005). The influence of religion on death anxiety and death acceptance. Mental Health Religion and Culture, 8(4), 253-261. DOI: 10.1080/13674670412331304311
Lester, D., Templer, D.I. & Abdel-Khalek, A. (2007). A cross-cultural comparison of death anxiety: A brief note. Omega: Journal of Death and Dying, 54(3), 255-260. DOI: 10.2190/W644-8645-6685-358V
Rathor, M.Y., Rani, M.F.A., Shahar, M.A., Jamalludin, A.R., Bin Che Abdullah, S.T., Bin Omar, A.M. & Bin Mohammad Shah, A.S. (2014). Attitudes toward euthanasia and related issues among physicians and patients in a multi-cultural society of Malaysia. Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care, 3(3), 230-237. DOI: 10.4103/2249-4863.141616
Shear, M. K. (2012). Grief and mourning gone awry: Pathway and course of complicated grief. Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, 14(2), 119-128. 
Stolz, E., Burkert, N., Grobschadl, F., Rasky, E., Stronegger, W.J. & Freidl, W. (2015). Determinants of public attitudes towards euthanasia in adults and physician-assisted death in neonates in Austria: A national survey. Plos One, 2015. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0124320