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Cited by 207Grief, Bereavement, and Mental HealthMaternal and Neonatal HealthcareMaternal Mental Health During Pregnancy and Postpartum

INTERNATIONAL COMPARISON OF STUDIES USING THE PERINATAL GRIEF SCALE: A DECADE OF RESEARCH ON PREGNANCY LOSS

Toedter, Lori J., Lasker, Judith N., Janssen, Hettie J. E. M.·2001·Death Studies
DOI 10.1080/074811801750073251
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Abstract

The Perinatal Grief Scale (PGS) has been used in many studies of loss in pregnancy, including miscarriage, stillbirth, induced abortion, neonatal death, and relinquishment for adoption. This article describes 22 studies from 4 countries that used the PGS with a total of 2485 participants. Studies that report Cronbach's alpha for their own samples give evidence of very high internal consistency reliability. Evidence for the validity of the PGS is also reviewed, such as convergent validity seen in its association with measures of mental health, social support, and marital satisfaction. The standard errors of the means for the total scale and for the subscales reveal fairly consistent scores, in spite of very different samples and types of loss; computation of means and standard deviations for the studies as a whole permits us to establish normal score ranges. Significantly higher scores were found in studies that recruited participants from support groups and self-selected populations rather than from medical sources, and from U.S. studies compared with those in Europe.

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  • The PGS-33 has been extensively evaluated, with psychometrically sound properties reported (Cronbach's alphas between 0.92 and 0.96).

    “The PGS-33 is the most common grief scale used among the perinatal loss literature and has been extensively evaluated, with psychometrically sound properties reported (including Cronbach’s alphas between 0.92 and 0.96) [66, 67].”

    From Factors contributing to men’s grief following pregnancy loss and neonatal death: further development of an emerging model in an Australian sample (2021) · cites this paper as [66]

  • High levels of complicated grief are generally associated with a poorer state of mental health.

    “Overall, high levels of CG are generally associated with a poorer state of mental health.13”

    From Complicated grief after perinatal loss (2012) · cites this paper as [13]

  • Poor social support from family and friends is associated with complicated grief reactions after perinatal loss.

    “Based on stress theory, social support is thought to have a buffering effect, and poor social support from family and friends is associated with CG reactions.8,10,13,32”

    From Complicated grief after perinatal loss (2012) · cites this paper as [13]

  • Pre-loss mental health status predicts the likelihood of a persistent intense grief reaction at 2 years of follow-up.

    “These findings are consistent with the study by Toedter and colleagues who evaluated pre -loss mental health13 and found that pre-event status predicted the likelihood of a persistent intense grief reaction at 2 years of follow-up.”

    From Complicated grief after perinatal loss (2012) · cites this paper as [13]

  • High levels of perceived emotional support from society are consistently associated with lower scores of perinatal grief.

    “High levels of perceived emotional support from society is consistently associated with lower scores of perinatal grief in all studies examining it.13”

    From Complicated grief after perinatal loss (2012) · cites this paper as [13]

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Authors
Toedter, L. J., Lasker, J. N., & Janssen, H. J. E. M.
Affiliations
Moravian University (US)
ORCID
Lasker, Judith N.
Venue
Death Studies
Publisher
Informa UK Limited
Published
2001-04-01
Volume
25
Issue
3
Pages
205-228
ISSN
  • 0748-1187 (ISSN-L)
  • 1091-7683
DOI
10.1080/074811801750073251
OpenAlex
W2157857104
Cited by
207
References
0
Citations by year
2026: 7 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 26 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 8 · 2016: 10 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 9 · 2012: 11
FWCI
4.46
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Death Studies (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Maternal and Neonatal Healthcare
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Maternal Mental Health During Pregnancy and Postpartum
Keywords
Perinatal Grief Scale, perinatal loss, miscarriage, stillbirth, abortion, neonatal death, grief measurement, scale reliability, convergent validity, cross-national comparison, support groups
MeSH terms
Abortion, Spontaneous, Abortion, Induced, Adoption, Europe, Fathers, Female, Fetal Death, Grief, Humans, Infant, Newborn, Male, Mental Health, Mothers, Perinatology, Pregnancy, Psychometrics, United States

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