Post by Deleted on Feb 7, 2016 8:13:28 GMT 7
Psychologists have analysed the last words of inmates who were condemned to death in Texas.
In a new paper, published in Frontiers in Psychology, researchers Dr. Sarah Hirschmüller and Dr. Boris Egloff used a database of last statements of inmates on death row and found the majority of the statements to be positive.
The researchers theorise that the inmates, the average age of whom in the current dataset is just over 39, expressed positive sentiments, because their minds were working in overdrive to avert them from fearing their current situation.
This is called 'Terror-Management Theory' (TMT). The concept is that people search for meaning when confronted with terror in a bid to maintain self-esteem and that "individuals employ a wide range of cognitive and behavioural efforts to regulate the anxiety that mortality salience evokes."
Take, for example, the last statement of inmate number 459, George Jones:
Continues
i100.independent.co.uk/article/there-is-a-harrowing-database-of-the-last-words-uttered-by-people-on-death-row--W1B4X3Uupe
In a new paper, published in Frontiers in Psychology, researchers Dr. Sarah Hirschmüller and Dr. Boris Egloff used a database of last statements of inmates on death row and found the majority of the statements to be positive.
The researchers theorise that the inmates, the average age of whom in the current dataset is just over 39, expressed positive sentiments, because their minds were working in overdrive to avert them from fearing their current situation.
This is called 'Terror-Management Theory' (TMT). The concept is that people search for meaning when confronted with terror in a bid to maintain self-esteem and that "individuals employ a wide range of cognitive and behavioural efforts to regulate the anxiety that mortality salience evokes."
Take, for example, the last statement of inmate number 459, George Jones:
Continues
i100.independent.co.uk/article/there-is-a-harrowing-database-of-the-last-words-uttered-by-people-on-death-row--W1B4X3Uupe
