The Role of Defense Mechanisms, Personality and Demographical Factors on Complicated Grief following Death of a loved one by Cancer

OBJECTIVE Identification of the risk factors and psychological correlates of prolonged grief disorder is vital for health promotions in relatives of persons who died of cancer. The aim of this research was to investigate the role of defense mechanisms, character dimension of personality and demographic factors on complicated grief following a loss of a family member to cancer. METHOD A number of 226 persons who had lost a family member to cancer in a cancer institute at Tehran University of Medical Science were selected through compliance sampling and completed the Inventory of complicated Grief-Revised (ICG-R), the Defense Styles Questionnaire (DSQ), the Character dimension of Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI), and the Demographical questionnaire. Data were analyzed by stepwise multiple regression analysis, using the PASW version 18. RESULTS Findings revealed that neurotic defense style had a significant positive predictive role in the complicated grief; and cooperativeness, age of the deceased person, self-transcendence and mature defense style had a significant negative predictive role in complicated grief (p<0.001). R2 was 0.73 for the final model (p<.001). CONCLUSION The results revealed that two character dimensions (low cooperativeness and self-transcendence), high neurotic defense style and young age of the deceased person were involved in the psychopathological course of the complicated and prolonged grief. It was concluded that personality characteristics of the grieving persons and demographics of the deceased person should be addressed in designing tailored interventions for complicated grief.