Participants addressed questions relating to the role(s) that deceased mentors continue to play in their lives, if any. Three active roles, designated as role model, situation specific guidance, and values clarification emerged, along with one inactive role designated remembrance formation. Roles were evenly distributed among participants. Membership in role category appeared unrelated to participants' age, gender, relationship to mentor, length and timing of mentoring, degree of grief resolution, emotional stability, and a number of other potentially relevant variables. Findings are discussed in relation to Western theories of grief, the emerging literature on continuing bonds with the deceased, and implications for conceptual changes in the language and goals of grief therapy and grief counseling.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AttigT. (1996). How we grieve: Relearning the world.New York: Oxford University Press.
2.
BaughS. G.LankauM. J., & ScanduraT. A. (1996). An investigation of the effects of protégé gender on responses to mentoring. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 49, 309–323.
BowlbyJ. (1971). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1.Hammondsworth, England: Pelican Books.
5.
BurkeR. J., & McKeenC. A. (1997). Benefits of mentoring relationships among manargerial and professional women: A cautionary tale. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 51, 43–57.
6.
ChaoG. T. (1997). Mentoring phases and outcomes. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 51, 15–28.
7.
DatsonS. L., & MarwitS. J. (1997). Personality constructs and perceived presence of deceased loved ones. Death Studies, 21, 131–146.
8.
EnshurE. A., & MurphyS. E. (1997). Effects of race, gender, perceived similarity, and contact on mentor relationships. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 50, 460–481.
9.
EriksonE. (1963). Childhood and society (2nd ed.), New York: Norton.
10.
EysenckH. J. (1975). Manual of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, London: Hodder & Stoughton.
11.
FairbairnW. D. (1952). An object relations theory of the personality.New York: Basic Books.
12.
FreudS. (1917/1957). Mourning and melancholia. In StruckeyJ. (Ed. and Trans.), The standard edition of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud (Vol. 14, pp. 239–260). London: Hogarth Press. (Original work published 1917).
13.
HaenslyP. A., & ParsonsJ. L. (1993). Creative, intellectual, and psychosocial development through mentorship. Youth and Society, 25, 202–221.
14.
KaufmanF.HarrellG.MilamC.WoolvertonN., & MillerJ. (1986). The nature, role and influence of mentors in the lives of gifted adults. Journal of Counseling and Development, 64, 576–578.
15.
KlassD. (1988). Parental grief: Solace and resolution.New York: Springer.
16.
KlassD. (1996). Grief in Easter culture: Japanese ancestor worship. In KlassD.SilvermanP. R., & NickmanS. L. (Eds.), Continuing Bonds: Washington, DC: Taylor & Francis.
17.
KlassD.SilvermanP. R., & NickmanS. L. (Eds.). (1996). Continuing bonds: New understandings of grief.Washington, DC: Taylor & Francis.
18.
LevinsonD. J. (1978). The seasons of a man's life.New York: Knopf.
19.
MarwitS. J., & KlassD. (1994/95). Grief and the role of the inner representation of the deceased. Omega: Journal of Death and Dying, 30, 283–289.
20.
MethR. L., & PasickR. S. (Eds.). (1990). Men in therapy: The challenge of change.New York: Guilford Press.
21.
MeuserT. M., & MarwitS. J. (In press). An integrative model of personality, coping and appraisal in the prediction of grief involvement in adults. Omega: Journal of Death and Dying.
22.
MorgensonG. (1992). Greeting the angels: An imaginal view of the mourning process.Amityville, NY: Baywood.
23.
PiperW. E.McCallumM., & AzimH. F. A. (1992). Adaptation to loss through short-term psychotherapy.New York: Guilford Press.
24.
RosenbalttP., & MeyerM. (1986). Imagined interactions and the family. Family Relations, 35, 319–324.
25.
RubinS. (1985). The resolution of bereavement: A clinical focus of the relationship of the deceased. Psychotherapy, 22(2), 231–235.
26.
SilvermanP. R., & KlassD. (1996). Introduction: What's the problem? In KlassD.SilvermanP. R., & NickmanS. L. (Eds.), Continuing Bonds: Washington, DC: Taylor & Francis.
27.
SilvermanP. R.NickmanS., & WordenJ. W. (1995). Detachment revisited: The childs reconstruction of a dead parent. In DokaK. J. (Ed.), Children mourning, mourning children (pp. 131–148). Washington, DC: Hospice Foundation of America.
28.
StroebeM.GergenM. M.GergenK. J., & StroebeW. (1992). Broken hearts or broken bonds: Love and death in historical perspective. American Psychologist, 47, 1205–1212.
29.
TorrenceE. P. (1984). Mentor relationships: How they aid creative achievement, endure, change, and die.Buffalo, NY: Bearly, Ltd.
30.
WordenJ. W. (1982). Grief counseling and grief therapy: A handbook for the mental health practitioner.New York: Springer.
31.
WordenJ. W. (1991). Grief counseling and grief therapy: A handbook for the mental health practitioner (2nd Ed.). New York: Springer.
32.
YamamotoJ.OkonojiK.IwasakiT., & YoshimuraS. (1969). Mourning in Japan. American Journal of Psychiatry, 126, 74–182.
33.
ZeyM. G. (1984). The mentor connection.Homewood, IL: Dow Jones-Irwin.
34.
ZuckermanH. (1977). Scientific elite: Nobel laureates in the United States.New York: Free Press.
