Understanding posthumous sperm retrieval during war through a terror management theory perspective

Terror Management Theory (Tmt, solomon et al., 1991) claims that individuals use three anxiety buffer mechanisms to regulate their death awareness - cultural worldviews, self-esteem, and proximity seeking. In this article, we use these three TMT anxiety buffers to explain the phenomenon of posthumous sperm retrieval, requested by spouses or parents, usually of young soldiers who died during their military service. Whereas this phenomenon has been known for some time, it increased dramatically in the initial days following the massacre conducted by the Hamas terrorist organization in Israel on October 7, 2023. We claim that this was an immediate reaction to this terror event, which posed a direct, existential threat to those who were exposed to the massacre and the soldiers who defended the country, but also to the entire Israeli society, as well as for Jews around the globe. We use interpretive phenomenology to qualitatively examine the phenomenon of retrieving sperm from dead young men, analyzing the requests to retrieve sperm posthumously as a sign of the need to provide these young men with symbolic immortality, on both personal and national levels. We integrate this explanation with the military ethos and the tendency of Israeli society to endorse familyist and pronatalist values to expand our understanding of this contemporary phenomenon in Israel.

Parents' Anticipated Discussions About Death With Young Children

Guided by family communication patterns theory and terror management theory this mixed-methods investigation explored how parents (N = 112) of young children (ages 3-6) described the way they would discuss death when it comes up in conversations. Responses were coded inductively, resulting in four themes: explanations that death is inevitable, explanations that death is in the distance, the use of religion to frame discussions of death, and finally, discussing afterlife connections to deceased family members. Logistic regression analyses were used to evaluate whether parents' conformity or conversation orientations were associated with the frequency with which parents discussed death with their child and the content of parent vignette responses. Quantitative analysis revealed parents' conversation orientations were associated with the frequency with which they discussed death with their child and conformity orientations were associated with parents' use of religion and discussing afterlife connections to deceased family members in their responses.

Applying terror management theory to patients with life-threatening illness: a systematic review

BACKGROUND

Terror management theory (TMT) posits that people manage death-related anxiety through the meaning provided by their cultural world-views and the sense of personal value provided by self-esteem. While a large body of research has supported the core propositions of TMT, little research has focused on its application to individuals with terminal illness. If TMT can help healthcare providers better understand how belief systems adapt and change in life-threatening illness, and the role they play in managing death-related anxiety, it may provide guidance on how to improve communication around treatments near the end of life. As such, we set out to review the available research articles that focus on describing the relationship between TMT and life-threatening illness.

METHODS

We reviewed PubMed, PsycINFO, Google Scholar, and EMBASE through May 2022 for original research articles focused on TMT and life-threatening illness. Articles were only deemed appropriate for inclusion if direct incorporation of the principles of TMT were made in reference to a population of interest whom had life-threatening illness Results were screened by title and abstract, followed by full review of candidate articles. References were also scanned. Articles were assessed qualitatively.

RESULTS

Six relevant and original research articles were published which provide varied levels of support for TMT's application in critical illness, each article detailed evidence of ideological changes consistent with what TMT would predict. Building self-esteem, enhancing the experience of life as meaningful, incorporating spirituality, engaging family members, and caring for patients at home where meaning and self-esteem can be better maintained are strategies supported by the studies and serve as starting points for further research.

CONCLUSION

These articles suggest that applying TMT to life-threatening illness can help identify psychological changes that may effectively minimize the distress from dying. Limitations of this study include a heterogenous group of relevant studies and qualitative assessment.

No significant effect of mortality salience on unconscious ethnic bias among the Japanese

OBJECTIVE

Terror management theory posits that when mortality is salient, individuals attempt to defend their cultural worldviews. Although numerous studies have confirmed this hypothesis, some recent studies have suggested that East Asians do not engage in worldview defense. We conducted a pre-registered experiment with 895 Japanese adults to investigate whether they exhibited worldview defense at an unconscious level. Participants performed the Implicit Association Test using Japanese and Korean surnames as stimuli after being primed with thoughts about mortality.

RESULTS

The results revealed that mortality salience had no influence on implicit ethnic bias. These findings support the notion that East Asians do not engage in worldview defense, in accord with recent criticism of the validity of terror management theory. We discuss the limitations and implications of our findings.

Exploring the impact of the pandemic on the relationship between individual types and the natural environment:

COVID-19 is a global event that has impacted every individual on earth in some way and can be viewed as a mortality salience trigger. Although there were reports of increased nature exposure across the world, research is needed to understand whether the pandemic event impacted the underlying psychology of the human-nature nexus. Given the likelihood of pandemics and environmental challenges increasing in frequency in the future, there is a need for a deeper understanding of how pandemics impact individuals' relationship with the natural environment in South Africa. To achieve this, the study applied psychological types (grouping individuals based on homogeneity) to explore potential shifts as human nature is neither fixed, nor universal. The study asked: Given the multiple significant impacts of COVID-19 on the African continent, how have perceptions and attitudes towards the natural environment changed within and between types of individuals from 2016 (pre COVID) to 2021 (COVID) in South Africa? In a longitudinal, quantitative study, separate samples 721 in 2016 and 665 in 2021 were obtained. Participants in 2021 were grouped into the same six types using the same criteria, for comparison with the 2016 data. The results showed limited potential for pandemics to act as catalysts for long-term individual change towards increased pro-environmentalism. The study confirmed the main tenets of Terror Management Theory that individuals tend to be driven to uphold worldviews when confronted with mortality. Furthermore, there was a reduced experience of personal control over outcomes that increased reliance on sources of control outside the self as an attempt to buffer against mortality concerns. The study contributes towards Terror Management Theory's application during pandemics, and how that relates to individual environmental attitudes and perceptions.

Death anxiety and mental health: Requiem for a dreamer

Recently, there has been an increased interest in the role of death anxiety in a broad range of mental health disorders. It has been argued that the fear of death may be a transdiagnostic variable contributing to the development and maintenance of many chronic mental health problems. Further, it has been suggested that death anxiety may be responsible for relapse and the emergence of new disorders in patients that have received successful treatment for earlier conditions in their lives. Given this, the purpose of the present selective review is to: (1) explore contemporary theoretical accounts of the role of death anxiety in a broad range of human behaviours; (2) examine evidence for death anxiety as a key variable in mental health disorders; (3) examine evidence on the treatment of death anxiety in both non-clinical and clinical populations; (4) describe the limitations of the current literature, and; (5) provide a detailed description of the critical future directions for this field.

Charitable Giving in Times of Covid-19: Do Crises Forward the Better or the Worse in Individuals?

Why did some individuals react to the Covid-19 crisis in a prosocial manner, whereas others withdrew from society? To shed light onto this question, we investigate changing patterns of charitable giving during the pandemic. The study analyzes survey data of 2000 individuals, representative of the populations of Germany and Austria. Logistic regressions reveal that personal affectedness by Covid-19 seems to play a crucial role: those who were personally affected either mentally, financially, or health-wise during the first 12 months of Covid-19 were most likely to have changed their giving behavior. The observed patterns fit psychological explanations of how human beings process existential threats. Our findings indicate that a profound societal crisis in itself mainly leads to changes in charitable giving if individuals are severely affected on a personal level. Thereby, we contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying individuals' charitable giving behavior in times of crisis.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11266-023-00558-y.

The Relationship Between Religious/Spiritual Beliefs and Subjective Well-Being: A Case-Based Comparative Cross-National Study

The most unique aspect of religiosity/spirituality (R/S), supernatural beliefs, and their relationship with SWB has hardly been examined. This study explores the relationship between six R/S supernatural beliefs and SWB, in a case-based comparative cross-national design including two religious and two secular nations. Data were obtained from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) Religion IV module from the religious countries of the USA (n = 1060) and Turkey (n = 1353) and the secular countries of Denmark (n = 1281) and Czech Republic (n = 1112). SWB was measured as happiness and self-rated health. Statistical analyses were performed using binary logistic regression models replicated across countries. Results indicated that the American sample showed no evidence of relationships between R/S and SWB outcomes capable of improving the model over demographic and service attendance covariates. In Turkey, some R/S beliefs were found to be statistically significantly related to SWB, with positive and negative associations with happiness. No associations were found in the secular countries. Findings were discussed in the light of previous research and interpreted from a terror management theory perspective.

Taking the Divinity from the Divine: The Interaction Between Death Concerns and Religiosity on the Evaluation of a Human Jesus

Quest religiosity is characterized by an openness toward religious doubt and uncertainty as a way to grow existentially. The current paper examines how death awareness contributes to quest (vs low quest) Christians' reactions toward a Jesus depicted as doing biologically human actions (e.g., vomiting, bleeding). Study 1 evaluated quest persons' reactions to either a humanistic Christ or a neutral Jesus passage. Essay evaluations were examined in Study 2 as a function of quest and mortality salience. Study 3 measured death-thought accessibility following a creaturely Jesus prime for quest individuals. Participants who scored low on quest were more negative toward a creaturely, rather than neutral, Jesus. These effects were exaggerated following thoughts of death. Finally, low quest persons reported heightened death thoughts due to incarnational ambivalence. The implications are discussed.

How healthcare workers respond to COVID-19: The role of vulnerability and social support in a close relationships defense mechanism

Healthcare workers play a vital role in the fight against COVID-19. Based on Terror Management Theory (TMT), the present research examined whether a close relationships defense mechanism reduces anxiety among healthcare workers (N = 729) in China. Our results suggest that this defense mechanism, as indexed by relationship satisfaction, serves as an effective terror management source after exposure to reminders of death (MS; mortality salience). These findings extend TMT by identifying two moderating variables: vulnerability and social support. In a low objective vulnerability group, healthcare workers who subjectively believed themselves as less vulnerable to COVID-19 showed a stronger defense mechanism after a MS manipulation as compared to those who felt more vulnerable. Further, healthcare workers with higher levels of social support reported more relationship satisfaction. These findings have practical implications for guiding healthcare workers on how to buffer death-related anxiety and maintain their mental health in the fight against COVID-19.

Understanding user responses to the COVID-19 pandemic on Twitter from a terror management theory perspective: Cultural differences among the US, UK and India

This study uses a new approach to understand people's varied responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Heightened media coverage and surging death tolls undoubtedly increase individuals' death-related thoughts. Thus, this study draws on terror management theory to analyze the general public's reactions during which mortality is salient. Twitter data were collected from three countries—the US, the UK, and India. Topic modeling analysis using Latent Dirichlet Allocation identified a total of seven themes reflecting two types of defenses: proximal defenses and distal defenses. Proximal defenses included calls for behavioral changes in response to COVID-19. Distal defenses included searching for meaning, political polarization and government incompetence, racial division, and sharing up-to-date information. During a prolonged crisis, anxiety-buffering systems can be undermined and lead to either maladaptive defenses (i.e., psychological distress) or new forms of defenses (i.e., adjusting to the new normal). The analysis highlights cultural differences in defenses across the three countries. Theoretical and practical implications for public health practitioners and social media platform managers are then discussed.

Infodemic: the effect of death-related thoughts on news-sharing

Research on the sharing of fake news has primarily focused on the manner in which fake news spreads and the literary style of fake news. These studies, however, do not explain how characteristics of fake news could affect people's inclination toward sharing these news articles. Drawing on the Terror Management Theory, we proposed that fake news is more likely to elicit death-related thoughts than real news. Consequently, to manage the existential anxiety that had been produced, people share the news articles to feel connected to close others as a way of resolving the existential anxiety. Across three experimental studies (total N = 416), we found that it was not news type per se (i.e., real versus fake news) that influenced news-sharing intentions; instead, it was the increased accessibility to death-related thoughts elicited from the content of news articles that motivated news-sharing. The findings support the Terror Management framework and contribute to the existing literature by providing an empirical examination of the underlying psychological motive behind fake news-sharing tendencies.

Is Nationalism Rising in Times of the COVID-19 Pandemic? Individual-Level Evidence from the United States

Following the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, analysts have noted a global rise of nationalism as countries have engaged in a number of nationalist moves in response to the pandemic. However, the implication of policy changes at the individual-level remains unclear: do citizens support those nationalist government responses? More importantly, do people tend to be more nationalistic following the outbreak? Building on terror management theory (TMT), this article examines whether and how ideological beliefs affect individuals' support for nationalist policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. According to TMT, to cope with death anxiety, people are predisposed to ideological defense, resulting in cohesion with individuals who validate their beliefs and hostility toward those who threaten them. Thus, we argue that when states' nationalist policies are aligned with their ideology, people tend to support them; yet, when states' nationalist policies contradict their ideology, people tend to withdraw their support. Specifically, this study found that as non-conservatives (compared to conservatives) are more concerned with the virus, they are more likely to show an inclination of ideological validation. Given that their ideology advocates more tolerance, non-conservatives are less likely to support nationalistic policies. To test the hypotheses, we applied structural equation modeling to a March 2020 CNN Poll (nationally representative US data about COVID-19). The statistical analysis demonstrated strong support for our arguments.

[Coronavirus: Predictive brain and terror management]

Emerging infectious diseases like Covid-19 cause a major threat to global health. When confronted with new pathogens, individuals generate several beliefs about the epidemic phenomenon. Many studies have shown that individual protective behaviors largely depend on these beliefs. Due to the absence of treatment and vaccine against these emerging pathogens, the relation between these beliefs and these behaviors represents a crucial issue for public health policies. In the premises of the Covid-19 pandemic, several preliminary studies have highlighted a delay in the perception of risk by individuals, which potentially holds back the implementing of the necessary precautionary measures: people underestimated the risks associated with the virus, and therefore also the importance of complying with sanitary guidelines. During the peak of the pandemic, the salience of the threat and of the risk of mortality could then have transformed the way people generate their beliefs. This potentially leads to upheavals in the way they understand the world. Here, we propose to explore the evolution of beliefs and behaviors during the Covid-19 crisis, using the theory of predictive coding and the theory of terror management, two influential frameworks in cognitive science and in social psychology.

Social curiosity as a way to overcome death anxiety: perspective of terror management theory

Social curiosity has been found to have great benefits in human life, especially in fostering interpersonal relationships. Nevertheless there is indication of other benefit of social curiosity that have not yet been explored, namely overcoming the anxiety of death. This indication is based on previous research which found a positive relationship between anxiety and social curiosity. In this study, social curiosity is framed as representation of symbolic immortality, which people use to overcome the terror of death. To support this conjecture, two studies were conducted using the Terror Management Theory (TMT) framework. Study 1 (N = 352, M age = 19.39) found a positive relationship between death anxiety and social curiosity. In Study 2 (N = 507, M age = 20.68) it was found that intolerance of uncertainty and desire for self-verification mediated the relationship between death anxiety and social curiosity. The results of this study indicate that increasing interest in obtaining information about how other people think, feel, or act is a form of mechanism used by people to control anxiety related to death.

The role of oxytocin in terror management processes

Research on terror management theory found evidence for the idea that attachment and interpersonal touch attenuate existential concerns and worldview defense reactions after mortality salience. Oxytocin, on the other hand, is known for stimulating the attachment system. Therefore, we hypothesized that worldview defense reactions after mortality salience would be attenuated under oxytocin. In the present study, participants administered oxytocin or placebo and performed a typical terror management paradigm: After visualizing death or a control topic, worldview defense reactions were assessed by evaluating the authors of a pro- and an anti-German essay. Overall, the results did not provide strong support for the hypothesis. There was no effect of mortality salience on the overall worldview defense measure and, importantly, no moderation by oxytocin. However, with regard to the sympathy dimension, the expected pattern was revealed: The pro- and anti-German authors were evaluated as more balanced under oxytocin after mortality salience, whereas this was not the case under placebo. This was due to more positive evaluations of the anti-German author in the oxytocin group. Although this specific result was not expected a priori, sympathy was the only trait among all worldview defense variables that referred to a social level. Therefore, it seems possible that oxytocin is able to buffer existential concerns, but only if they are socially relevant.

Does the mortality salience effect on worldview defence depend on the cultural orientation of Chinese people?

According to the terror management theory, people tend to favour their worldview and in-group members after being reminded of death (i.e., mortality salience [MS] effect). However, inconsistent findings of the MS effect were found among Chinese people. In the present study, we examined the MS effect with Chinese samples and tested whether the effect would depend on participants' cultural orientation and relational self-esteem. In Studies 1 (N = 227) and 2 (N = 221), we examined the roles of participants' cultural orientations and relational self-esteem in their evaluations on moral transgression and/or perceived regard from people around after being primed with mortality (vs. dental pain) salience. We obtained the interaction effects of mortality salience, cultural orientations, and relational self-esteem. The implications of these results are discussed in the context of Chinese culture.

Visual cues of threat elicit greater steady-state electroencephalographic responses than visual reminders of death

Terror management theory (TMT) suggests that reminders of death activate an exclusive anxiety mechanism different from the one activated by other types of symbolic threats. This notion is supported by evidence showing how experimental participants verbally reflecting on their own death are then influenced in their opinions and behaviours. A previous study showed that magnitude of electroencephalography (EEG) activity is greater when images depicting death-related content are coupled with painful thermal stimuli compared to threat-related content. Here we expand on previous research by testing whether similar effects may be brought about by passive observation of generic visual reminders of death. More precisely, we hypothesised that fast periodic presentation of death-related vs. more generic threat-related images determine a preferential modulation of brain activity measured by means of EEG. In two experiments, we found that images depicting death content elicit lower frequency-tagged EEG response compared to more generic threat images. Visual evoked potentials revealed that a brief change of the scene from neutral to threat content elicits greater amplitude at the late latencies (compatible with a P300 potential), particularly at the parieto-occipital sites. Altogether, our findings suggest that, in a context where no reflection on death cues is allowed and no threatening stimuli in other modality occur, visual death cues trigger lower neural synchronisation than that elicited by similarly negative and arousing cues with divergent threatening meaning.

Visual reminders of death enhance nociceptive-related cortical responses and event-related alpha desynchronisation

Previous research suggests that prompting individuals to think on their own mortality affects their perception of painful somatic stimuli and related brain activity. Grounded on the assumption that reminders of mortality may recruit threat-defence mechanisms similar to the ones activated by painful nociceptive stimuli, we hypothesize that the effects exerted by linguistic reminders of death on pain perception and brain activity would be elicited by passive observation of death-related pictures vs. more generic threat-related pictures. Results showed an increase of the laser evoked P2 amplitude and oscillatory theta activity when participants observed death-related images. However, no change in pain ratings was found. Moreover, observation of death-related content was linked to increased oscillatory alpha desynchronisation but not to variations of visual evoked potentials amplitude. Our findings indicate that pairing potentially noxious stimuli with death-related images exerts a preferential modulation of nociceptive and visual cortical representations.

Mortality salience modulates cortical responses to painful somatosensory stimulation: Evidence from slow wave and delta band activity

Social psychology studies show that awareness of one's eventual death profoundly influences human cognition and behaviour by inducing defensive reactions against end-of-life-related anxiety. Much less is known about the impact of reminders of mortality on brain activity. Here we tested whether reminders of mortality can induce a modulation of the slow electroencephalographic activity triggered by somatosensory nociceptive or auditory threatening stimulation and if this modulation is related to mood and anxiety as well as personality traits. We found a specific slow wave (SW) modulation only for nociceptive stimulation and only following mortality salience induction (compared to reminders of an important failed exam). The enhancement of SW negativity at the scalp vertex was associated with increased state anxiety and negative mood, whereas higher self-esteem was associated with reduced SW amplitude. In addition, mortality salience was linked to an increased amplitude of frontal delta band, which was correlated also with increased positive mood and higher self-esteem. The results indicate that SW and delta spectral activity may represent both proximal and distal defences associated with reminders of death and that neurophysiological correlates of somatosensory representation of painful and threatening stimuli may be useful for existential neuroscience studies.

Death concerns and psychological well-being in mothers of children with autism spectrum disorder

PURPOSE

Utilizing a terror management theory perspective, the present research examined whether having a child with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is associated with underlying cognitions and explicit worries about death, and their roles in psychological well-being.

METHOD

147 mothers of children with ASD (n=74) and typically developing children (n=73) completed a fear of death scale, as well as measures of death-thought accessibility, positive and negative affect, depression, and anxiety.

RESULTS

Following previous research, mothers of children with ASD reported worse psychological health. Additionally, they evidenced greater death-thought accessibility compared to mothers of typically developing children, but did not differ in explicit worries about mortality. Greater death-thought accessibility, in turn, mediated the influence of ASD diagnosis on negative affect, depression, and anxiety.

CONCLUSION

The current study offers an initial understanding of the association between mortality concerns and psychological health for mothers of children with ASD. Further, it underscores the importance of health care providers' efforts to attend to, and educate parents about, their thoughts of mortality, even if the parent does not acknowledge such concerns.

WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS

The present study examined the impact of both implicit and explicit worries about death in parents of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Specifically, we were able to demonstrate that increased death-thought accessibility among mothers of children with ASD was associated with worse psychological health. While it is possible for parents of children with ASD to report conscious worries about death, there were no observed differences on this measure. As far as we know, this work is the first to empirically examine the prevalence of mortality-related concerns in this population and the subsequent effects of death-thought accessibility on psychological health. This is an important avenue of research as parents of children with ASD may experience greater worries about leaving their children upon death with no one to care for them, or to leave their children in the care of individuals who may not understand their son or daughter's unique needs. Additionally, the current findings highlight the importance of addressing mortality-related concerns, even when they may not be explicitly recognized, among parents of children with ASD. Given the effectiveness of parent education programs for children with ASD, a primary avenue for intervention may be education. Training care providers in ways to better discuss thoughts of death may help to alleviate stress and foster greater psychological well-being.

Culture and its neurofunctional correlates when death is in mind

The human fear of death is marked by specific psychological reactions that affirm cultural belonging. Terror management theory explains this phenomenon with the symbolic immortality provided by collective meaning in culture. This coping has also been explained with the motive of maintaining a meaningful representation of the world. Here we show that neural patterns of activations corresponding to cultural worldview defense processes differed when images that affirmed participants' cultural heritage were preceded by death-related verbal primes versus verbal primes threatening meaning. Cultural content was drawn upon distinctly on a neural basis when facing death-related cognitions. The neural representation of cultural coping sheds light on the immediate mechanisms in compensating the human fear of death.

Macro- and micro-level predictors of age categorization: results from the European Social Survey

This study evaluated macro- and micro-level variables associated with individuals' perception of the ending of youth, the beginning of old age, and the length of the middle age period. The European Social Survey is a biennial multi-country, cross-sectional survey. Our analysis is based on the fourth wave, which included a rotating module on ageism. The source sample consisted of 28 countries and a total of 54,988 respondents. Whereas macro-level variability accounted for 14 % of the variance associated with the perception of the ending of youth, only 5.7 % of the variance associated with the perception of the beginning of old age was accounted for by macro-level variability. Almost 10 % of the variance associated with the perception of the middle age period was associated with macro-level variability. Different patterns of macro- and micro-level correlates emerged for the ending of youth, beginning of old age, and the period of middle age. Overall, results demonstrate that individual differences in the perception of the ending of youth, the beginning of old age, and the length of the middle age period are more pronounced than contextual differences. Results also suggest that individuals' mental maps regarding the timing of these events are not necessarily concordant.