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Open research questions in Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health

646 gap statements mined from Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health papers in our 7.9M-paper local library, which holds 6,066 papers on the topic — drawn mostly from each paper's own stated research gap, future-work, challenge and limitation notes, and its abstract. The ones listed below are a selection still marked open; each names the study that raised it, with a DOI link where the paper has one.

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What the literature leaves open

  • The relationship between general grief research and ecological grief has received little attention. There is a need for a deeper understanding of ecological grief and its various forms. The paper notes that earlier scholarship on disenfranchised ecological grief needs further distinctions of the various forms it may take.

    Ecological Sorrow: Types of Grief and Loss in Ecological Grief · 2024 · DOI

  • Little is known about MRKH-related mental health, coping, and identity across the lifespan or the role of positive adaptation in individuals’ experiences of MRKH.

    Grief, adjustment, and acceptance: A qualitative study of mental health, coping, and identity in people with Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser Syndrome (MRKH) · 2026 · DOI

  • Volunteer recovery workers who perform forensic identification work face significant psychological challenges, such as exposure to human remains and the experience of posttraumatic stress, yet the long-term role of social support in their adaptation remains understudied.

    An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of Social Support and Self-Disclosure Among Dentists Volunteering in Forensic Identification: Looking Back After 30 Years · 2026 · DOI

  • However, the mechanism by which SOC mediates psychological distress remains unexplored longitudinally.

    Role of Sense of Coherence in Mediating the Relationship Between End-of-Life Caregiving Burden and Bereavement Depressive-Symptom Trajectory · 2026 · DOI

  • While preliminary, these findings suggest that poor sleep may contribute to the exacerbation of PG symptoms in the short term, highlighting the need for further research into the temporal dynamics and potential causal mechanisms linking sleep and grief.

    Sleepless Longing: Bidirectional Associations Between Sleep Quality and Prolonged Grief in Daily Life After Traumatic Loss · 2026 · DOI

  • While cross‐sectional and longitudinal studies have linked PGD with poor sleep, the directionality and timing of these effects remain unclear.

    Sleepless Longing: Bidirectional Associations Between Sleep Quality and Prolonged Grief in Daily Life After Traumatic Loss · 2026 · DOI

  • However, little is known about the dynamic associations between grief rumination and daily affect in bereaved individuals' everyday lives.

    Reciprocal Temporal Associations Between Grief Rumination and Daily Affect in Bereavement · 2026 · DOI

  • Larger multicenter randomized controlled trials with extended follow-up are warranted to confirm and expand upon these results.

    Implementation of a smartphone-based perinatal bereavement care training program for obstetric nurses and midwives: quasi-experimental study · 2026 · DOI

  • However, studies on the impact of mass kidnapping on families during armed conflict remain scarce.

    The trauma of mass kidnapping and ambiguous loss: A socioecological framework from the lived experience of Israeli hostage families. · 2025 · DOI

  • Future research should examine the impact of pre-registration exposure on graduate midwives’ readiness to provide bereavement care.

    Navigating grief Pedagogy in Midwifery: Insights from interviews with clinical midwifery educators · 2025 · DOI

  • Anxiety sensitivity, fear of one's anxiety-related symptoms, has been positively associated with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in other trauma populations but has not been studied in the suicide bereaved.

    Anxiety sensitivity, finding the body, and posttraumatic stress disorder in suicide-bereaved treatment-seeking adults. · 2024 · DOI

  • Given the inevitability of spousal bereavement for many, further investigation into potential modifiers of bereavement-related loneliness is warranted.

    Understanding loneliness after widowhood: The role of social isolation, social support, self-efficacy, and health-related factors · 2024 · DOI

  • Mobile phone applications potentially offer an efficient and cost-effective way to deliver self-help to bereaved adults, yet controlled effectiveness studies are lacking.

    My grief app for prolonged grief in bereaved parents: a randomised waitlist-controlled trial · 2024 · DOI

  • Randomized controlled trials are warranted to confirm the intervention's efficacy.

    Self-compassion-based online group psychotherapy for bereavement-related grief: The COMPACT feasibility trial · 2024 · DOI

  • However, evidence on the reciprocal predictive relationship between social support and PTG is lacking, particularly among the bereaved.

    The Reciprocal Relationship Between Social Support in Bereavement and Posttraumatic Growth—A Random Intercept Cross‐Lagged Analysis · 2024 · DOI

  • The study had a limited number of participants. The sample size was reduced in Round III, which may have influenced representativeness.

    Information and counselling on post-mortem reproduction: a Delphi study with ART specialists · 2026 · DOI

  • There is a lack of robust empirical evidence and standardized clinical pathways for post-mortem ART/IUI. There is a need for multidisciplinary, consensus-informed guidance to support clinical practice in post-mortem ART/IUI.

    Information and counselling on post-mortem reproduction: a Delphi study with ART specialists · 2026 · DOI

  • We did not aim to define a distinct grief profile for people with autism, but rather to illustrate the diversity of grief expressions that have been identified in research and warrant further exploration. The findings of our review show that the number of studies focusing specifically on support structures remains limited, and few studies have included the perspectives of people with autism themselves.

    Grief, Bereavement, and Related Care for People With Autism: a Scoping Review · 2026 · DOI

  • There is a lack of understanding about how parents experience the immediate moment of loss. There is a lack of guidelines and recommendations for professionals on how to support affected parents.

    Needs of parents during their intrauterine or perinatal child loss – a qualitative multi-method study · 2026 · DOI

  • There is a gap in understanding the impacts of suicide bereavement on mental, physical, and social health outcomes. There is a need to identify key gaps in the current research literature and explain their implications for clinical postvention strategies.

    Suicide Loss and Its Impacts on Mortality, and Mental, Physical, and Social Health Outcomes: A Systematic Review of Registry-Based Studies · 2026 · DOI

  • The experience of pet loss is a significant and understudied phenomenon. There is a lack of research on the experience of pet loss in the Ukrainian context.

    АДАПТАЦІЯ ТА ЕМПІРИЧНА ВЕРИФІКАЦІЯ ОПИТУВАЛЬНИКА ПРОЖИВАННЯ ТЯЖКОЇ ВТРАТИ ДОМАШНЬОГО УЛЮБЛЕНЦЯ (PET BEREAVEMENT QUESTIONNAIRE) В УКРАЇНСЬКОМУ КОНТЕКСТІ · 2026 · DOI

  • Previous research has focused on multi-agency investigation of sudden infant deaths, with little known about parents' experiences for deaths of older children.

    Needs and experiences of families after a sudden unexplained death in childhood: a qualitative study · 2025 · DOI

  • It has been repeatedly shown that comorbidity between PGD and PTSD is frequent especially after violent losses, but only few studies have investigated the relationship between PGD and cPTSD.

    Prolonged Grief in Refugees Seeking Treatment for PTSD: Comorbidity with Post‐Traumatic Stress Symptoms and Network Structure · 2025 · DOI

  • Healthcare professionals may struggle to provide adequate support to bereaved parents. Administrative processes may not be adapted to accommodate the needs of bereaved parents.

    Needs of parents during their intrauterine or perinatal child loss – a qualitative multi-method study · 2026 · DOI

  • Given that the military context emphasises combat-related deaths, and anticipating similar losses in other families, the focus should be on intervention strategies, especially preventive ones. Families should be trained in self- and group-care techniques through seminars, with a focus on bolstering psychological resources to enhance widows’ resilience.

    Widowhood and the Psychological Well-Being of the Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) Widows · 2026 · DOI

Most-cited papers in Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health

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Open questions raised by papers listed on this page include: (1) Little is known about MRKH-related mental health, coping, and identity across the lifespan or the role of positive adaptation in individuals’ experiences of MRKH (“Grief, adjustment, and acceptance: A qualitative study of mental health,…”, 2026); (2) The mechanism by which SOC mediates psychological distress remains unexplored longitudinally (“Role of Sense of Coherence in Mediating the Relationship Between End-of-Life…”, 2026); (3) While cross‐sectional and longitudinal studies have linked PGD with poor sleep, the directionality and timing of these effects remain unclear (“Sleepless Longing: Bidirectional Associations Between Sleep Quality and…”, 2026); (4) Little is known about the dynamic associations between grief rumination and daily affect in bereaved individuals' everyday lives (“Reciprocal Temporal Associations Between Grief Rumination and Daily Affect in…”, 2026); (5) Larger multicenter randomized controlled trials with extended follow-up are warranted to confirm and expand upon these results (“Implementation of a smartphone-based perinatal bereavement care training…”, 2026). 646 gap statements have been mined from Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health papers in our 7.9M-paper local library, which holds 6,066 papers on the topic; the gaps come from whichever of those papers state one. They are mostly the research gaps the authors state and the papers' abstracts, plus future-work, limitations and challenges passages. The ones listed below are a selection still marked open; each names the study that raised it, with a DOI link where the paper has one, so you can read the original claim in context.

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