Chapter-2
FEAR OF DEATH
Some waste away for statues and name.
And often from fear of dying man will be seized with disgust for life,
will hate the light,
So with sorrowing hearts they pass their sentence, death,
Forgetting that all their cares spring from this fear.
– Lucretius C-58 B.c. Rome.
“On the Nature of Things”
The idea of death, the fear of it, haunts the human animal like nothing else; it is a mainspring of human activity – activity designed largely to avoid the fatality of death, to overcome it by denying in some way that is the final destiny of man.
– Ernest Becker, Professor of Sociology and Anthropology.
“The Denial of Death” 1973
Death Anxiety or Fear of Death
It is believed that humans became aware of their deaths around 150,000 years ago. In that extremely short span of evolutionary time, humans have fashioned multiple forms of denial to deal with the death anxieties.
According to psychologists, death anxiety (fear of death) is the abnormal or persistent fear of one owns death or the process of his/her dying. There are two kinds of death anxiety – Predatory death anxiety and Existential death anxiety. Predatory death anxiety arises from the fear of being harmed – for example bitten by a snake, or attacked by a tiger. It is the most basic and the oldest form of death anxiety. It is a form of self-protective adaptative response seen in all organisms, animals and men. In many animals and men, it leads to fight or flight response, to escape the life threatening situation.
Existential death anxiety is the basic knowledge and awareness that natural life must end one day. Existential death anxiety is the most powerful form of anxiety. We defend against this type of death anxiety by denial. Limited amount of denial is helpful in dealing with unpleasant things in life. It is a way for us to cope. But excessive amount of denial in the long run is harmful. For example, if you are diagnosed with a deadly form of cancer, you deny it and don’t seek treatment, you will ultimately die. It is a matter of time.
Various Theories
Sigmund Freud believed that people express a fear of death. He called it thanatophobia (thanato-death, phobia-fear). According to Freud, people who express death-related fears actually are trying to deal with unresolved childhood conflicts. Now nobody believes in Freud’s theory.
Developmental Psychologist, Erik Erikson, formulated the psychological theory that people progress through a series of crises as they grow elder. Once an individual reaches the latest stages of life, they reach a level, what Erikson titled as “ego integrity.” Ego integrity is when one comes to terms with his or her life and accepts it. When one can find meaning or purpose in his or her life, he/she has reached the ego integrity stage. In contrast, when an individual views his or her life as a series of failed and missed opportunities, he/she has not reached the ego integrity stage. Elders that have attained this stage of ego integrity, are believed to have less of death anxiety. Erikson’s work was influenced by the Hindus and the Buddhists concepts of stages of life – pupil (Bramachaya), householder (Grahastha), the departure to the forest (Vanaprastha), and the wondering holy beggar (Sannyasi). People in the sannyasi stage of life, are no longer afraid to die. They are detached from the usual worldly activity and wait for death to come.
Paul T. P. Wong’s works indicate that human reaction to death are complex, multifaceted and dynamic. Some people are neutral about it, some accept it and others want to escape from it. According to Ernest Becker, Professor Sociology and Anthropology, death anxiety is not only real, but also it is people’s most profound source of concern. Many people’s daily behavior consists of attempts to deny death and to keep their death anxiety under strict control. The method of suppression usually depends upon one’s cultural beliefs.
Other theories on death anxiety were introduced in the late part of the twentieth century – by Rollo May, victor Frankle and others. Adrian Tomer introduced the regret theory. According to this theory, the possibility of death usually make people more anxious if they feel that they have not and cannot accomplish any positive in the life they are living.
Personal Meaning of Death
According to V. G. Cicirelli (1998), people tend to develop personal meanings to death. Those meanings could be positive or negative. If they are positive; then the consequences of those meanings can be comforting to the individual. In other words if they accept death as salvation or moskha, they are not afraid of death. On the other hand, if their attitude towards death is negative when they face death, they are emotionally tormented by it.
Religiosity’s Effect
A 2013 study involving people from U.S., Turkey and Malaysia found that religiosity is positively correlated with increase fear of death, meaning more religious individuals fear death more (Ellis). It has also been shown that death anxiety tends to be lower in individuals who regularly attend religious services or gatherings (Wen). This may be so, because many religions see death as an end of one life and beginning of another like – reincarnation or transmigration of the soul. Bottom-line, religion can have both positive and negative effect depending upon the individual.
Age and Death Anxiety
The earliest documentation of the fear of death has been found in children as young as 5. Death is the most commonly feared item throughout adolescence (Griffith). However, studies have shown that teaching children about death (in a biological sense) decreases their fear of death (Slaughter). It is during the years of young adulthood (20 to 40 years of age) that fear of death begins to become prevalent. However, during the next phase of life, the middle age adult years (40 – 64 years of age), death anxiety peaks at its highest levels. Surprisingly levels of death anxiety drops off in the old age years (65 and older years). This is in contrast with most people’s expectation of the elderly and the aging process (Kurlycheck and Trenner).
Michel de Montaigne, wrote in his essay Aquitaine (C-1573) : “Nothing can be grievous that happens only once. Is it reasonable to fear so long a thing so short? Long life and short life are made all by death. For there is no long or short for things that are no more. Aristotle says that there are little animals by the river Hyparis that live only a day. The one that dies at eight O’ clock in the morning dies in its youth, the one that dies at five in the afternoon dies in its decrepitude……Your death is a part of the order of the universe; it is a part of the life of the world.” Montaigne died at the age of fifty nine in 1592.
Sources
- Wikipedia.org/ Death-anxiety 12/26/13
- Langs, R.. “Three Forms of Death Anxiety.” Retrieved from www.escp.org/death-anxiety,2004
- Castano Emanuel, “Ideology, Fear of Death and Death Anxiety: Political Psychology, 2011, P- 617
- Langs, R. “Adaptive insight into death anxiety”. The Psychoanalytic Review, 2003, P-575
- Cicerell; V.G. “Personal meaning of death in relation to fear of death.” Death Studies, 22(8)713-732 1998
- Ellis, L. et.all. “Religiosity and fear of death: A three-nation comparison”. Mental Health, Religion and Culture 16(2): 179.2011
- Wen,Y. “Religiosity and death anxiety.” The Journal of Human Resource and Adult Learning. 6(2), 31-37, 2010
- Slaughter, V., Griffith, M. “Death Understanding and Fear of Death in Young Children.”Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 12(4) 525-535, 2007