What has become of grief counseling? An evaluation of the empirical foundations of the new pessimism.

Abstract

A pessimistic view of grief counseling has emerged over the last 7 years, exemplified by R. A. Neimeyer's (2000) oft-cited claim that "such interventions are typically ineffective, and perhaps even deleterious, at least for persons experiencing a normal bereavement" (p. 541). This negative characterization has little or no empirical grounding, however. The claim rests on 2 pieces of evidence. The 1st is an unorthodox analysis of deterioration effects in 10 outcome studies in B. V. Fortner's (1999) dissertation, usually attributed to Neimeyer (2000). Neither the analysis nor Fortner's findings have ever been published or subjected to peer review, until now. This review shows that there is no statistical or empirical basis for claims about deterioration effects in grief counseling. The 2nd piece of evidence involves what the authors believe to be ill-informed summaries of conventional meta-analytic findings. This misrepresentation of empirical findings has damaged the reputation of grief counseling in the field and in the popular media and offers lessons for both researchers and research consumers interested in the relationship between science and practice in psychology.

Effects of Support, Counselling and Therapy Before and After the Loss: Can we Really Help Bereaved People?

“…Larson & Hoyt, 2007;2009;, which can be understood as substantiating the above argument. A second explanation may be that help offered may interfere with the natural grieving process.…”

“…During the last decade, several extensive qualitative reviews and metaanalyses have been published, reporting patterns in the efficacy studies of grief therapy and grief counselling (Allumbaugh & Hoyt, 1999;Currier, Holland, & Neimeyer, 2007;Currier, Holland, & Neimeyer, 2010;Currier, Neimeyer, & Berman, 2008;Kato & Mann, 1999;Larson & Hoyt, 2007;Schut et al, 2001). Although these evaluations do not all come to exactly the same conclusions, and the scientific debate about the efficacy of bereavement intervention still continues, the evidence points in the direction that most bereaved people do not need and will not gain from grief therapy or counselling.…”

The Elephant on the Couch: Side-Effects of Psychotherapy

“…The same risk has been attributed to grief therapy. In a meta-analysis of 23 randomized controlled trials, Neimeyer reported that 38% of patients undergoing grief therapy may have done well if they had not received treatment [26], although this analysis is controversial [27]. In the 'possibly harmful' treatment group, Lilienfeld included group interventions for antisocial behaviour based on deviancy training, as noted in the previous section [14]; boot camp programmes for adolescent and adult offenders [28]; as well as debriefing and rebirthing strategies.…”

Use of Bibliotherapy in the Treatment of Grief and Loss: A Guide to Current Counseling Practices

“…Whereas these results may cause concern, Jordan and Neimeyer suggested that negative outcomes might be a consequence of ineffective grief counseling interventions provided during the research studies or of methodological flaws, including inadequate sample sizes, lack of theoretical base, poor sampling procedures, and use of unsound measures. Additionally, recent research has called into question Jordan and Neimeyer's findings, citing similar studies that found no evidence to demonstrate that grief counseling was less effective than other forms of counseling or that grief counseling might be harmful to typical grievers (Larson & Hoyt, 2007). Regardless, additional research is indicated to determine specific grief counseling interventions that would be most helpful for distressed clients.…”