<b>Fear modalities related to death and dying in institutionalized and non-institutionalized elderly women</b> - DOI: 10.4025/actascihumansoc.v31i2.6936

Abstract

In the present work, the nature of fears related to death and the dying process was investigated in elderly women, 60 to 86 years of age, identifying convergences and divergences between two groups: 15 institutionalized (II) and 15 non-institutionalized (INI) elderly women. Semi-structuralized interviews were conducted, individually and/or in group, phenomenologically guided, recorded and later transcribed. From the reading of the discursive material, modalities of fears were identified based on the Kastembaum and Aisemberg (1983) conjectures. In both groups, modalities of fear were detected related to the dying process: in group II, indignity (40%) and for group INI, personal suffering (40%). We also found other modalities not described by the authors, including: denial and absence of fear (33.34 and 13.33% for II, and 20 and 6.66% for INI, respectively). The categorization process was insufficient to encompass the complexity of experiences lived by the elderly women and their respective verbalizations. Although it is possible to understand them from previously conceived theoretical models, a series of impressions told by the elderly women did not constitute any type of index. The results suggest that the nature of the fears related to the dying process is also associated with the bio-psycho-social conditions of the elders: those of group II tend to fear, more frequently than INI, the feeling of indignity that accompanies the dying process, from being dependent on other people. For those in INI, the fear of dying tends be related more frequently to the possible physical suffering that occur in the time of death.