Culture, connection, and prolonged grief: a cross-sectional study of social networks and interpersonal emotion regulation after loss

Background: According to the Emotion Regulation Repertoire of Social Support (ERROSS) model, interpersonal emotion regulation (IER) provided by social network members may play an important role in adaptation to bereavement.Objective: The present study examined social network and IER structures in two cultural groups (i.e. Chinese-speaking and German-speaking) of bereaved adults.Method: A total of 187 bereaved individuals who had lost a first-degree relative participated in an online study completing measures of their social network and access to IER from their network.Results: German-speaking bereaved adults reported larger social networks, access to more grief-specific and general IER strategies and a larger emotion regulation repertoire, compared to Chinese-speaking bereaved adults. Cluster analysis identified three clusters of socioemotional support: resource-scarce cluster (32%), resource-moderate cluster (44%) and resource-abundant cluster (24%). Among Chinese-speaking bereaved individuals, the resource-scarce cluster was predominant (51%), whereas the resource-moderate cluster accounted for the largest proportion among German-speakers (64%). Prolonged grief symptoms were more severe in the resource-scarce cluster than those in the resource-abundant and resource-moderate clusters. Culture did not moderate the relationship between ERROSS variables and grief.Conclusions: This is the first study to examine ERROSS in a cross-cultural context. The findings characterize the interpersonal environments individuals encounter following loss and provide implications for designing culturally sensitive psychosocial interventions that focus on interpersonal support.