Abstract

BUSCOVICH-LA ROSA, Lissette; AVARIA-RAMIREZ, Franchesca; FERNANDEZ-SAMIT, Romina  and  PARRA-GUTIERREZ, Paulina. The Death Attitudes expressed by young adults from Tarapacá region in COVID-19 context. Revista de Psicologia [online]. 2022, n.27, pp.33-62. ISSN 2223-3032.  https://doi.org/10.53287/10.53287/devr4986ox84p.

This research analyzed the attitudes towards death expressed by a group of young adults in a COVID-19 context. The participants were 10 young residents in the Tarapacá region (60% women, 40% men) between 18 and 29 years old. The methodology had a mixed approach of qualitative preponderance and sequential design. First, the Death Attitude Profile-Revised [DAP-R] was administered to measure five attitudes: Fear of Death, Death Avoidance, Approach Acceptance, Escape Acceptance, and Neutral Acceptance. Subsequently, semi-structured interviews were applied that deepened the results, by exploring the perceptions, emotions and thoughts of the participants during the pandemic. Finally, the quantitative and qualitative data were triangulated to obtain greater validity. The results point to these attitudes as a contextual phenomenon, the expression of which depends on various personal and environmental elements, the most important being the fears associated with family members. In young people, death was understood as a distant reality. This influenced a high neutrality and low fear of own death. The COVID-19 context acted as an influencing factor in attitudes, particularly in fear of contagion or the possibility of dying. Although the young people recognized the dangerousness of the virus, their emotional-affective needs were seen as more urgent problems. Therefore, fears in the COVID-19 context did not prevent exposure to contagion in the company of friends. These behaviors were signified as measures of psychological self-care, particularly in young people with Escape Acceptance.

Keywords : COVID-19 pandemic; Death Attitude; Tarapacá; Young adults; DAP-R.

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