Abstract
The purpose of this paper was to examine features of attitudes toward death in early and middle adolescence. The Scale of Attitude toward Death was administered to junior and senior high school students. This scale consisted of six subscales: "fear of death," "intention to live out own life," "meaning of death for life," "underrating of death," "belief in existence of afterlife," and "choice of death-of-body / death-of-mind." The surveys were conducted five times at one-year intervals (total N = 1742). The results suggested that positive attitudes toward life and negative attitudes toward death decrease during the years of junior high school. Belief in existence of an afterlife weakened with increasing grade level. Scores on the subscale of "meaning of death for life" did not change with grade level. The data showed that the structure of attitudes toward death was invariant in early and middle adolescence. Finally, experiences of bereavement for family members or close friends did not affect adolescents' attitudes toward death.
