“Adult” conceptualization of irreversibility: Implications for the development of the concept of death

Abstract Studies of the development of children's understanding of death typically compare the children's understanding against a presumed mature adult concept. This study examined the validity of one component of that adult concept—irreversibility—by comparing actual adult data to the presumed adult standard and to actual child data. A group of 165 undergraduates took a self-administered questionnaire containing five questions concerning the irreversibility of death. Subjects answered each question by circling one of four responses—“yes,” “no,” “don't know,” or “not sure”—and provided explanations for their answers. In their circled responses the adults, as a group, conformed less well to the presumed adult standard than did the children in an earlier study. However, the adults' explanations indicated that their lower conformation to the presumed adult concept was not the result of some anomalous regression but was a by-product of their more sophisticated understanding of the complexity of present-day efforts to conceptualize the exact boundary marking the transition from life to death. Implications for further study of both the development of the concept of death and the general theory of concept development are discussed.