Two experiments explored age differences in response to reminders of death. Terror management research has shown that death reminders lead to increased adherence to and defense of one's cultural worldview. In Study 1, the effect of mortality salience (MS) on evaluations of moral transgressions made by younger and older adults was compared. Whereas younger adults showed the typical pattern of harsher judgments in response to MS, older adults did not. Study 2 compared younger and older adults' responses to both the typical MS induction and a more subtle death reminder. Whereas younger adults responded to both MS inductions with harsher evaluations, older adults made significantly less harsh evaluations after the subtle MS induction. Explanations for this developmental shift in responses to reminders of death are discussed. Keywordsterror management; fear of death; moral judgments and aging; healthy aging Aging entails more than just the emergence of new wrinkles, impaired memory, or increased joint pain; it also entails knowing that one is moving inexorably closer to death. For older adults, frequent medical problems, loss of loved ones, and deteriorating cognitive abilities are just a few reminders that the end of life is drawing nearer. Terror management theory (TMT; Correspondence NIH-PA Author ManuscriptNIH-PA Author Manuscript NIH-PA Author ManuscriptGreenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1986) asserts that awareness of the inevitability of death has a potent impact on human judgment and behavior. Empirical support for TMT has been obtained in a large body of research (for a review, see showing that reminders of mortality increase young adults' self-esteem striving and defense of their cherished beliefs and values (i.e., their cultural worldviews). Although people of varying ages have been included in these studies, none of this research has explicitly examined these processes in older adults. Given older adults' more frequent encounters with mortality; the changes in cognitive, social, and emotional functioning that occur in later life; and the adaptations they often make in response to these changing life circumstances (e.g., P. B. Baltes & Baltes, 1990; Brandtstadter & Greve, 1994;Heckhausen & Schulz, 1995), it seems likely that this population would differ in their responses to mortality. Research is needed to assess possible age-related differences in the use and adaptation of terror management processes to cope with reminders of mortality. The research reported here explored this issue by testing hypotheses derived from an integration of TMT with ideas from a variety of developmental theories. Following Becker (1973), TMT posits that the uniquely human knowledge of the inevitability of death in an organism that is biologically oriented toward staying alive creates the potential for paralyzing terror. People are protected from the anxiety that awareness of death would otherwise produce by maintaining faith in their cultural worldviews and attaining self-esteem by living up to the standards of that w...

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Building on previous existential theorizing, terror management theory provides a unique approach to conceptualizing the development, maintenance, and impact of psychological disorders. The theory suggests that awareness of mortality creates the potential for anxiety, which is managed by an anxiety-buffering system consisting of one's cultural worldview, self-esteem, and interpersonal attachments. The pursuit of meaning, personal value, and interpersonal connections that motivates much human behavior is driven, in part, by the need to control this potential for death-related anxiety. This article provides an overview of terror management theory and a discussion of its implications for understanding clinical conditions, along with a review of research exploring the roles of deathrelated anxiety and the anxiety-buffering system in anxiety disorders, posttraumatic stress disorder, and depression.

Anxiety-Buffer Disruption Theory (ABDT) posits that posttraumatic stress disorder is associated with a disruption of normal anxiety-buffer functioning produced by traumatic events that produce high levels of dissociation. Two experiments conducted among survivors of the 2005 Zarand earthquake in Iran supported four hypotheses derived from ABDT: (1) dissociation predicts atypical responses to death-and trauma-related thoughts, (2) dissociation predicts stronger affective responses to death-and traumarelated thoughts, (3) PTSD symptom severity 2 years after the event is associated with continued disruption of anxiety-buffer responses, (4) the relationship between dissociation 1 month posttrauma and posttraumatic symptoms 2 years later is mediated by disrupted anxiety-buffering functioning. The role of anxiety-buffer disruption in both clinically significant and seemingly benign but socially problematic responses to traumatic events was discussed.

Many studies demonstrate that mortality salience can increase negativity toward outgroups but few have examined variables that mitigate this effect. The present research examined whether subtly priming people to think of human experiences shared by people from diverse cultures increases perceived similarity of members of different groups, which then reduces MS-induced negativity toward outgroups. In Study 1, exposure to pictures of people from diverse cultures engaged in common human activities non-significantly reversed the effect of MS on implicit anti-Arab prejudice. In Study 2, thinking about similarities between one's own favorite childhood memories and those of people from other countries eliminated MS-induced explicit negative attitudes toward immigrants. In Study 3, thinking about similarities between one's own painful childhood memories and those of people from other countries eliminated the MS-induced reduction in support for peace-making. Mediation analyses suggest the effects were driven by perceived similarity of people across cultures. These findings suggest that priming widely shared human experiences can attenuate MS-induced intergroup conflict.