Long-term family system correlates of parental death during adolescence

The nuclear family interactional patterns of adults who experienced parental death during adolescence were examined in this study. Participants were divided into throe grief status groups (i.e., no-loss/control, resolved, unresolved) based on parental loss history. The Texas Revised Inventory of Grief (TRIG) was used to distinguish resolved and unresolved grief status. Three scales from the Personal Authority in the Family System Questionnaire (PAFS-Q) were used to measure nuclear family functioning. Separate 2 x 3 ANOVAs failed to support the hypotheses that (a) adults who were not parentally bereaved during adolescence will exhibit the highest levels of family functioning, followed by adults with resolved grief related to parental death during adolescence and adults with unresolved grief, respectively; and (b) males will have higher differentiation levels than females in the unresolved and resolved grief groups, but the reverse will be true in the no-loss group. Pearson correlations revealed grief status group and gender differences in the relationships between age at parent's death, past and present grief levels, and PAFS-Q measures.