Webinar Overview:

Grief literacy: Why it matters in improving grief and bereavement care

Grief literacy is necessary due to the successes - and failures - of support in the wake of loss. Grieving persons report family members, friends, work colleagues, and health and social care professionals people literally running away from them, “disappearing” from their lives, making hurtful comments, asking harmful questions, joking about the loss, offering platitudes, and generally lacking compassion. Bereaved people much more commonly seek support from family and friends than from professionals, yet a considerable minority of grievers - about one-third - report not receiving the support they would have liked.

Potential supporters struggle to manage their own feelings, do not know how to broach the topic, are limited in the “language” of grief, and their actions focus on comforting themselves rather than on supporting the grieving person. The grief literacy movement aims to benefit all people experiencing all kinds of loss. In this webinar, the concept of grief literacy will be introduced and illustrated through a series of short vignettes and applications.

Learning Outcomes:

Upon completion of this webinar, participants will be able to:

• understanding the concept of grief literacy and its relevance to grief and bereavement care
• comprehending the successes and failures of social support in the wake of loss
• applying the concept of grief literacy to various contexts

Presenter Bio: Lauren J. Breen PhD FT

Lauren Breen, Ph.D. FT is a Professor of Psychology and Discipline Lead of Mental Health Psychology at Curtin University, Perth, Australia. Lauren’s 170+ publications show substantial breadth across multiple areas of dying, death, and bereavement. She is passionate about communicating her research findings to health professionals and the wider community within her own country and around the world and translating her research into policy and practice.

Lauren led an international team that developed the concept of grief literacy and is currently researching grief literacy for adolescents and young adults. She is a Fellow of the Australian Psychological Society; a Fellow in Thanatology: Death, Dying and Bereavement; a member of the International Work Group on Death, Dying and Bereavement. She received the 2022 Research Recognition Award from the Association for Death Education and Counseling (USA) and recently delivered a TEDx talk on the myths of grief. Lauren is on the Board of the Grief Australia and Lionheart Camp for Kids. She is the managing editor of Death Studies and co-editor, along with Dr Carrie Arnold, of the Routledge International Handbook of Child and Adolescent Grief in Contemporary Contexts, which will be out in 2024.

Presenter's Email: [email protected]