Childhood Trauma of Bereavement and the Effect on the Irrational Thought Process

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Intro

Trauma is defined as a ‘deeply distressing or disturbing experience’ and if this occurs during childhood it can have a detrimental effect on the individual and have an effect on their cognitive development. Examples of childhood traumas can include neglect, physical or sexual abuse, divorce and loss of a loved one amongst others.

In the study conducted by Melhem, Walker, Moritz et al (2008) they looked at the Sequelae of Sudden Parental Death in Offspring and Surviving Caregivers. It was a population-based study. The results showed that there was an increase of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder amongst the bereaved offspring. There was a 3-fold increase in depression for the offspring. Around 4% of children experience the death of a parent in western countries and is often seen as one of the most stressful times that a child can go through.

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However some of the limitations of the study include that there might have been a referral biased as families that are worried about the offspring might have been more likely to have participated also, they used an informant instead of the self-report in regard to the case of the deceased probands.

Wilcox el al (2010) looked at the risk of psychiatric hospitalization, violent crimes and suicide on children whose parents had died from suicide and other violent causes. This was done through a retrospective cohort study. The results found that the children of parents who had committed suicide where at a higher risk of suicide compared to the other participants who parents had died from accidents or other causes. However, this varied on the time that the parent had committed suicide so if they had committed suicide when the offspring was a young adult then they were lower for the risk of suicide compared to the offspring that were children or in adolescence as the likely hood was increased threefold. This study showed that the age of the offspring at the time of the parental death is linked to the risk for suicide for the offspring. The study also found that parental suicide along with other forms of parental death increased the probability of offspring suicide, suicide attempts leading to hospitalisation, personality disorders and psychotic disorders but not alcohol and drug use disorder.

However, some of the limitations of this study include that the registers only have impatient treatment meaning that they were not able to analyse psychiatric problems that had been treated or untreated at outpatient facilities or before the year 1973. Generalization may be restricted due to primarily Caucasian population that have access to universal health care and with moderate socioeconomic status. The experiment did not include offspring that had a psychiatric admission before the parental death and offspring that did not have a biological surviving parent. Due to these exclusions the yielded likely had more conservative estimates of the offspring risk as those that were excluded could have been more vulnerable to the impact of their parent’s death

Another previous research includes Pitman, Osborne, Rantell and King (2015) this was a controlled cross-sectional study that was done in the United Kingdom. They wanted to test the hypothesis that young adults bereaved by suicide would have an increased risk of committing suicide and suicide ideation as compared to other young adults braved by other causes of sudden deaths. At the time of this study there was an estimation that suicide bereavement affects 9% of adolescents which increased in in 2018 to 10.9%. It was seen that adults that have been bereaved by suicide had a higher risk of attempting suicide compared to those who had been bereaved due to other sudden deaths. However, one of the limitations of this study was that there could have been a selection bias as only those who had higher educational institutions participated. There was also a male nonresponse bias meaning that the results are more likely to generalizable to young suicide bereaved women compared to men.

Berg, Rostila & Hjern (2016) this was a national cohort study done in Sweeden that looked at parental death during childhood and depression in young adults. They measured this the rate of hospital administrations for clinical depression. There were two different groups that they looked at, those whose parents had died from external death such as suicide and homicide and those whose had natural deaths such as illness. The results showed that there was a much higher percentage of hospital administration for those whose parents had died from external circumstances compared to those whose had natural death as there was a 2-3-fold increase males and a 70 – 100 percent increase in females.

As this study was carried out in Sweden, a Nordic welfare state which has a similar strong economic network for families that have lost a provider of the house, and the bills for the medical care of the family member are usually covered by the genral public. Meaning that the results of the study cannot be generalised as other places do not offer these benefits of society.

Throughout the literature and background research we noticed that the majority of studies were conducted in western countries. We cannot generalise these findings to eastern countries. In Van Ijzendoorn and Kroonenberg (1988) the meta-analysis showed that one of the highest percentages for insecure resistant attachment was Japanese children (27) compared to Sweden which was 4 and the UK which was 3%.

The gap that was recognized from the studies above as that they were all done in western countries, we wanted to see if there would be any differences if these studies were conducted in eastern countries and how they compare to each other.

The question

The gap that was recognized from the studies above as that they were all done in western countries, we wanted to see if there would be any differences if these studies were conducted in eastern countries and how they would compare to each other.

‘What are the effects of parental suicide on Japanese children’s irrational thought process’

Method

Participants

The participants will consist of 550 people aged between 18- 30 from japan. There is a large number of universities in japan and around 2.19 million university students, so we would aim to recruit these students by advertisement through the universities and asking them to take part in it the study. We would let them know beforehand on what the study is about, but not what is specifically being looked for.

Design

They would take part in the K6 scales. The questionnaire would be to measure mood and anxiety disorders, and to see if the control group that have suffered childhood bereavement have a higher score representing higher symptom of anxiety and mood disorders compared to the other group.

Independent variables- The different participants that take part in the questionnaire. Control groups. The contents of the questionnaire.

Dependable variable – The answers to the questionnaire. Compare the number of symptoms of anxiety and mood disorders between the two groups.

Materials

The materials that will be used is the K6 scale online questionnaire. So, they would need to have access to the internet and an email account. The k6 scales will be translated it to Japanese so the participants can understand it fully.

Procedure

The group will be split into two equal groups, one of the groups will consist of individuals who have suffered from parental or sibling bereavement during childhood and the other group will consist of individuals who did not suffer from childhood bereavement of their parents or siblings. The questionnaire would be sent to the universities that the participants are from and it would be distributed by sending an email with the questionnaire on a secure link. This link would be open for 8 weeks for the participant to submit their results. The data would be anonymous once it had been completed.

Ethical Considerations

All the participants will be over the age of 18 meaning that they are able to give consent. they will ask for them to give consent in order for the data to be released upon completion of the study. There is no risk of physical harm in taking part in the online questionnaire. Before they take part, they will have a debriefing page, so they broadly know what the researcher’s study is about. There is a risk of physiological harm as the topic can bring up past trauma and as it’s a sensitive topic there should be a page at the end of the questionnaire for support such as helplines numbers or websites that can be contact if this does occur. It should also be made clear to the participants where they can gain support from within their university and what help they can provide. The data will be kept secure and the participants would remain anonymous and numbered for identification.

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