A Study on Chinese High School Students'' attitude towards death and the need for Life and Death Education in Malaysia

• Main Authors: Lee-may Fung, 房麗媚
• Other Authors: Ming-chang Tsai
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2007
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/f3xxd9

碩士 === 南華大學 === 生死學研究所 === 95 === 　　The purpose of this research is to understand Malaysia Independent Chinese High School students’ attitude towards death, their need for life & death education, the factors that affect their attitude towards death and need for life & death education, and the relation between their attitude towards death and the need for life & death education. This research collected 1,014 samples from Year 2006 Senior Two students of 12 Chinese High schools. Questionnaire survey form was used and the research instruments were Death Attitude Profile-Revised (DAP-R) and the need for Life & death education survey form. The data were being analyzed in percentile rank, mean, deviation, t-test, one-way ANOVA, Scheffe’s posterior comparison and Pearson product-moment correlation. 　 　　The results were summarized as follows: 1. Eighty-one percent of high school students had deep memory of a dead person, 52.2% had encountered with death of family members and 73.9% had deep memory of death events. 2. Students’ attitude towards death was mainly of “neutral acceptance”, secondly on “fear of death” and “death avoidance” and lastly is the “escape acceptance” of death. 3. The students’ differences in gender, religious belief and the degree of belief, memories of dead persons and death events have significant effect on their attitude of the “fear of death”. 4. Male students tend to have higher “death avoidance” than the female students; and students who are middle child in their family also have higher “death avoidance” than the only child students. 5. Differences in students’ ancestry, religious belief and the degree in belief are significantly related with their “approach acceptance” of death attitude. 6. The different educational background of students’ parents revealed significant differences for the “neutral acceptance” and “approach acceptance” of students. 7. Students are highly needed for life & death education. The most needed area of life & death education is “suicide prevention and value of life” followed by “hospice care and grief counseling”. The other areas in ranking order are “death and humanity”, “death and medical”, “fear and myth of death”, “culture and rites”, and “religion and philosophy”. 8. The students’ need for life & death education is significantly effected by the difference of their gender, religious belief and its degree of belief, their mothers’ education background, their memories of dead persons and death events. 9. The students’ “fear of death”, “death avoidance”, “neutral acceptance” and “approach acceptance” correlated positively with their need for life & death education except the “escape acceptance” dimension correlated negatively. 　 　　According to the research results, suggestions have been made for the reference of Chinese High Schools and related educational bodies in order to introduce life & death education in Malaysia.