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Based on Terror management theory (TMT) and Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), the current perspective proposes that giving death a human form (e.g., The Grim Reaper) is conducive to dealing with reminders of personal mortality. Even so, such metaphors may not be helpful to everyone. Research has shown that individuals low in personal need for structure (PNS) may actively seek out creative and novel perspectives to defend against mortal concerns, whereas mortality salience reduces liking of dispositionally ambiguous targets for individuals high in PNS. Given this, it was predicted that individuals low in PNS (as opposed to those high in PNS) would retain hope when exposed to a personification of death. As predicted, we found that participants low in PNS (as opposed to those high in PNS) showed significantly more personal hope after writing about an imagined meeting with the Grim Reaper (the death metaphor condition), as opposed to a standard manipulation of mortality (death control condition).
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