ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors discuss their findings related to continuing bonds (CBs) with a focus on the implications for grief therapy. They also discuss whether maintaining a CB is beneficial to adjustment after bereavement, in terms of psychological theory and from a Chinese cultural perspective. The authors describe their findings on CBs among Chinese conjugally bereaved individuals. The idea of using reality contact to categorize CB could be considered as a precursor of the externalized–internalized CB paradigm. The authors provide the clinical implications of their findings. The theoretical framework underpinning the relinquishing of bonds can be traced back to classical psychodynamic theory. N. P. Field and C. Filanosky developed a 47-item questionnaire to measure all possible variants of CB expression. It is tempting to group CB expressions into categories, such as internalized and externalized, and suggest that different types of CB are related to different outcomes of bereavement adjustment.
