Lifespan Development in Context - Chapter 16: Death and Dying

Vocabulary practice flashcards focusing on key concepts, legal frameworks, and psychological models of death, dying, and bereavement from Chapter 16 of Lifespan Development in Context.

Death with dignity

Ending life in a way that is true to one’s preferences and controlling one’s end-of-life care.

Clinical death

The cessation of heartbeat and circulation.

Whole brain death

The irreversible loss of functioning in the entire brain.

Persistent vegetative state (PVS)

A condition in which a person appears awake but is not aware, resulting from the permanent loss of all activity in the cortex.

Patient Self-Determination Act (1990)

Legislation establishing the right of all competent adults to control their healthcare decisions through advance directives.

Living will

An advance directive in which people make known their wishes regarding medical care if they are incapacitated and unable to speak for themselves.

Durable power of attorney

An advance directive in which individuals authorize a health care proxy to make health care decisions on their behalf if they are unable to do so.

Euthanasia

Meaning "easy death," the controversial practice of assisting terminally ill people to die more quickly.

Passive euthanasia

The withholding or withdrawing of life-sustaining care.

Active euthanasia

Deliberately-induced death.

Physician-assisted suicide

A form of voluntary active euthanasia in which terminally ill patients make the conscious decision that they want their life to end before dying becomes a protracted process.

Hospice

End-of-life care emphasizing dying patients' needs for pain management, psychological, spiritual, and social support, and death with dignity.

Palliative care

Care focused on controlling pain and related symptoms of dying persons rather than treatment.

Noncorporeal continuation

The view or belief that some form of life exists after the physical body has died.

Mature understanding of death

A conception of death comprising four basic components: non-functionality, irreversibility, inevitability, and biological causality.

Dying trajectory

The rate of decline that people show prior to death, categorized into patterns such as abrupt-surprise death, short-term expected death, expected lingering death, and entry-reentry death.

Elizabeth Kübler-Ross’s five-stage model

A psychological model detailing emotional reactions to the dying process: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.

Bereavement

The state of loss resulting from the death of a loved one.

Grief

An emotional response to loss that includes an array of emotions such as hurt, anger, guilt, and confusion.

Mourning

Culturally patterned ritualistic ways of displaying and expressing bereavement, including special clothing, food, prayers, and gatherings.

Complicated grief

Serious grief that persists for more than 6 months after a loss, characterized by persistent intense yearning, longing for, and disruptive preoccupation with thoughts of the deceased.

Dual-process model

A model of grieving stating that bereavement is accompanied by both loss-oriented and restoration-oriented stressors.

Overload

A feeling during the bereavement process of having too much to deal with.

Widowhood

The status of a person who has lost a spouse through death and has not remarried.

Widowhood effect

The increased likelihood for a recently widowed person to die.