MEASURING CORE BEREAVEMENT PHENOMENA

As part of a longitudinal study of bereavement phenomena in three grou ps, bereaved spouses, bereaved adult children and bereaved parents, sc ale development was carried out using a pool of bereavement phenomenol ogy questions administered prospectively. The items were derived from the literature, in particular studies dealing with the measurement of grief/bereavement, as well as from clinical experience. Factor analysi s of theoretically grouped items produced seven subscales, three of wh ich tapped frequently experienced phenomena in the bereaved. These thr ee subscales formed the basis of a single measure, labelled the Core B ereavement Items (CBI), which demonstrated high reliability and sound face and discriminant validity. Preliminary analysis suggested that th e CBI will prove to be a reliable and valid instrument with respect to the measure of core bereavement phenomena in commonly bereaved groups in Western society.