Love & Loss, Psychology & Counseling, Social Sciences, Marriage & Family, Sociology 

The present civil disturbances in Northern Ireland have now entered their third decade and questions concerning the psychological and social cost of community violence have been raised on a variety of levels. Although an extensive range of studies have been conducted, surprisingly little attention has been given to the effects of violent death in this context. This study redresses the balance. The levels of psychological, social and physiological well-being were assessed in a sample of violently bereaved widows. A questionnaire was designed on the basis of findings from semi-structured interviews and participant observations in a pilot study. The General Heatlh Questionnaire (30 question version) was incorporated into this questionnaire. The results of this study confirm that violently bereaved widows suffer much higher levels of psychological distress than otherwise bereaved widows in Ulster. However, contrary to expectations, levels of distress for security widows and civilian widows were found to be similar although their actual coping pattern showed some interested differences. - from Amzon