A Developmental Perspective

If we adults want to help the child cope with death, it is essential that we know something of the child's world of thoughts and feelings. For discussion purposes we shall consider thinking and feeling as separate dimensions and deal with them separately, knowing, however, that the two processes are inseparably intertwined in the real flesh-and-blood person. In the final analysis, death remains a mystery, yet people have concepts, knowledge and understandings about death and dying. We are not born with these concepts, knowledge, or understandings. Rather, they develop and are learned. How this occurs is our topic of discussion.