This review of the empirical literature on the development of the concept of death focuses on 3 components of that concept: irreversibility, nonfunctionality, and universality. These findings overall suggest that the majority of healthy children in modern urban-industrial societies achieve an understanding of all 3 components between 5 and 7 years of age. Since this is also the age at which most children make the transition from preoperational to concrete-operational thinking, some relationship between these 2 processes seems likely. However, attempts to empirically validate that relationship have thus far yielded ambiguous results. Possible reasons for this ambiguity are suggested.

This review of the empirical literature on the development of the concept of death focuses on 3 components of that concept: irreversibility, nonfunctionality, and universality. These findings overall suggest that the majority of healthy children in modern urban-industrial societies achieve an understanding of all 3 components between 5 and 7 years of age. Since this is also the age at which most children make the transition from preoperational to concrete-operational thinking, some relationship between these 2 processes seems likely. However, attempts to empirically validate that relationship have thus far yielded ambiguous results. Possible reasons for this ambiguity are suggested.

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This is a cross-cultural study of the development of three components of the concept of death: Universality, Irreversibility, and Nonfunctionality. Two hundred and sixty-two Chinese and 215 U.S. children were interviewed individually using a standard interview schedule. Universality was understood at an early age by virtually all children in both cultures, as expected. However, the children's understanding of Irreversibility and Nonfunctionality varied with both culture and age: overall a greater percentage of Chinese than U.S. children gave the presumed mature adult response to each of these components; within both cultures this percentage decreased with age, rather than increasing as predicted by traditional theories of children's concept development. The children's explanation for their responses suggest that with increasing age children of both cultures develop a more complex but “fuzzier” conceptualization of death—one which increasingly includes both 1) Non-naturalistic and Naturalistic considerations and 2) uncertainty about the exact nature and location of the boundary between life and death. Implications for a more general understanding of how such complex “fuzzy” concepts develop and how they might be influenced by cultural and situational factors are discussed.

Different cohorts within a species fulfill different functions required for survival of the gene pool as a whole. Younger cohorts provide the flexibility necessary for the species to adapt to changes in its existing environment and to expand into new niches; older cohorts, the specialization necessary for maintaining the gene pool within those environmental niches to which the species has already adapted – thus providing a secure base from which the younger can venture out. A high rate of environmental change demands rapid adaptation by the younger cohort hence rapid differentiation of the cohort-structure of the species itself. Evidence is drawn from cellular biology, animal ethology, and human psychology. The ‘heredity-environment’ controversy and the ‘generation gap’ are considered as special instances of this dialectical relationship between cohorts at different levels of developmental analysis.