Spirituality-Related Experiences of Continuing Bonds after a Life Partner’s Suicide

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. Summary of the research and overall impression.

This study embarked on a qualitative exploration of post-bereavement spiritual experiences after a life partner’s suicide. It started with a description of the complexicities of post-suicide grief. Then it explored the landscape of studies and argues for a qualitative approach using in-depth interviews. It then thorougly described methods and materials. A broad team and an even broader selection of individuals from different life-views / religions, although all the same gender, were included. An abundantly llustrated results section described the five themes that have been found, followed by a well developed discussion section, and the well-founded conclusion that 'Spirituality-related continuing bonds during suicide bereavement should be considered in postvention strategies for the bereaved, practical helping, and in research because they can strongly influence the bereavement process and emotional well-being of the bereaved.'    

2. Areas for improvement

All minor points, no major points:

As far as I can see, no mention has been made of a point of data-saturation. This needs more clarification. Has a point of data-saturation been reached? And a point of Inductive thematic saturation? See further doi: 10.1007/s11135-017-0574-8

No mention or differentiation of 'positive' and 'negative' religious / spiritual coping has been made. This would make the outcomes even more useful for clinical practice and make a connection with a broadly used distinction of R/S coping. 

Line 221: The reference of approval by the Psychology Research Ethics Committee of anonymized University (22 January 2021, Number 56) lacks a reference to the Helsinki Declaration of other guidelines that guarantee good care for the rights of subjects. See https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki-ethical-principles-for-medical-research-involving-human-subjects/

Line 571: The authors state in the discussion that 'spirituality might be a way not to continue the bond, suggesting that the bond should not be continued or providing means to disconnect from the deceased’s soul.' In other sections of the articles references to one's soul are clear from the perspective of participants. Here a somewhat broader definition is advisable like 'the deceaseds's soul or remembrance'. 

 

Author Response

Dear reviewer, thank you for your review and comments regarding our article. We will try to respond to each of your points.

As far as I can see, no mention has been made of a point of data-saturation. This needs more clarification. Has a point of data-saturation been reached? And a point of Inductive thematic saturation? See further doi: 10.1007/s11135-017-0574-8

Thank you for your point about data-saturation. We’ve read the article which you have referred with interest. We also considered the data-saturation approach while conducting the study. However, the method which was used in the current article is not consistent with the data saturation idea, which is a post-positivistic view to the research. Braun and Clarke (whose work about reflexive TA was taken as a model for our research) writes that while using reflexive TA we have to agree that data saturation can not be considered, at least not in the terms other authors use it. They argue that the researchers to dwell with uncertainty and recognise that meaning is generated through interpretation of, not excavated from, data, and therefore judgements about ‘how many’ data items, and when to stop data collection, are inescapably situated and subjective, and cannot be determined (wholly) in advance of analysis (citing this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/2159676X.2019.1704846).

This is why we added additional information about this choice to stop data collection to the corrected manuscript in the procedure section.

No mention or differentiation of 'positive' and 'negative' religious / spiritual coping has been made. This would make the outcomes even more useful for clinical practice and make a connection with a broadly used distinction of R/S coping. 

Thank you for suggesting to add about religious/spiritual coping. We are familiar with the concept and tried to incorporate a bit to our corrected manuscript in the introduction and discussion sections.

Line 221: The reference of approval by the Psychology Research Ethics Committee of anonymized University (22 January 2021, Number 56) lacks a reference to the Helsinki Declaration of other guidelines that guarantee good care for the rights of subjects. See https://www.wma.net/policies-post/wma-declaration-of-helsinki-ethical-principles-for-medical-research-involving-human-subjects/

The approval was given by the university in which we as authors work. The principles the ethics committee works are surely the same as Helsinki Declaration, however, we reviewed examples from our colleagues in many different publications how to refer to this and didn’t find any good example. The only way we found was to refer to our comity’s official document, which is not in English, but at least is an official document. 

 Line 571: The authors state in the discussion that 'spirituality might be a way not to continue the bond, suggesting that the bond should not be continued or providing means to disconnect from the deceased’s soul.' In other sections of the articles references to one's soul are clear from the perspective of participants. Here a somewhat broader definition is advisable like 'the deceaseds's soul or remembrance'. 

Thank you for your notice, we corrected the sentence using your advice.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Author did not get bogged down into definitions of "spirituality," and focused instread on the way "continuing bonds" work out after a problematic death. This research only had 11 subjects- which may not be enough to qualify it for a statistically-based empirical study. But it showed how idiosyncratic and complex persons' experiences of loss and separation can be, especially when linked to cultural and religious traditions that make suicide itself taboo. As an American, this reviewer noticed how psychological interpretations and frameworks were absent from the subjects' own narratives. Today, at least in the USA, psychiatric categories have mitigated the condemnation of suicide even with the Roman Catholic Church. So, family members will say "he was bi-polar" as an explanation for a suicide, letting go of more traditionally-religious teachings and questions. By contrast, the subjects of this paper's research draw on folklore about restless spirits, communications with and for the dead. There seems to be little discussion over what led to the suicide. And the advice of the priests seems to reveal ignorance of current therapeutic perspectives on bereavement. Perhaps this is what makes this research interesting- it shows persons creating and discerning meanings, when the "official" or public meanings are unhelpful or simply lacking.

Author Response

Dear reviewer, thank you for your review and comments regarding our article. Thank you for your interesting comparison between our research participants’ and American perspectives towards suicide. The spirituality-related explanations and experiences in our research might be related also to the fact that the spirituality-related topics were raised during the interviews with the research participants (and that the participants, who came to the study, knew that the idea of this research was to consider spirituality-related topics). We think that this allowed the participants to talk about their experiences as they are, although, in other contexts that kind of beliefs and experiences might not be accepted. However, as you have written, it is interesting how people at least in the research’s cultural field make the subjective meanings.