Five stages of grief

According to the model of the five stages of grief, or the Kübler-Ross model, those experiencing sudden grief following an abrupt realization (shock) go through five emotions: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Though widely used, the theory is empirically unsupported.

Introduced as "The Five Stages of Death" by Swiss-American psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in 1969, this model has been known by various names, including "The Five Stages of Loss", "The Kübler-Ross Model", the "Kübler-Ross Grief Cycle", the "Grief Cycle", "The Seven Stages of Grief", and the "Kübler-Ross Change Curve".

History

The model was introduced by Kübler-Ross in her 1969 book On Death and Dying, and was inspired by her work with terminally ill patients. Motivated by the lack of instruction in medical schools on the subject of death and dying, Kübler-Ross examined death and those faced with it at the University of Chicago's medical school. Kübler-Ross's project evolved into a series of seminars which, along with patient interviews and previous research, became the foundation for her book. Although Kübler-Ross is commonly credited with creating stage models, earlier bereavement theorists and clinicians such as Erich Lindemann, Collin Murray Parkes, and John Bowlby used similar models of stages or phases as early as the 1940s. In the foreword to the first 1970 English edition of On Death and Dying, Colin Murray Parkes wrote, "This book describes how some American individuals have coped with death."

In her book, Kübler-Ross states that the medical advancements of the time were the mark of change for the way people perceive and experience death. Due to this, pediatricians have been seeing fewer life-threatening ailments for their patients compared to one hundred years ago.