This paper describes a new method for operationalizing attitudes toward death utilizing the Twenty Statements Test format and emphasizes the social and symbolic nature of these attitudes. A theoretical rationale and empirical data are presented. Responses to the “What is Death?” question were obtained from seventy-nine nurses. Seventeen categories were generated from a content analysis of these responses. Coding reliability checks produced substantial agreement. Subjects expressed varied and contradictory meanings toward death which included religious, nonreligious as well as favorable and unfavorable attitudes. The TST strategy is uniquely appropriate for tapping the social, symbolic, and contradictory meanings that are often held of death.
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