Growing research suggests that death anxiety may be transdiagnostic, playing a key role in the development and symptomology of psychopathology. This meta-analysis examined the relationship between death anxiety and mental illness symptoms. In total, 104 papers were included, representing cross-sectional data from 99 studies ( = 24,434), and experimental data from 11 studies ( = 1372). Meta-analyses of cross-sectional studies indicated a moderate correlation ( = 0.397) between death anxiety and overall mental illness symptoms. The clinical nature of the group emerged as a significant moderator of this effect. In addition, the relationship between death anxiety and mental illness symptoms was larger for clinical samples ( = 0.580), and for anxiety-related symptoms ( = 0.506) than for depression. Additional meta-analyses of 11 mortality salience studies revealed that death reminders had an overall moderate impact on clinical symptoms (Hedge's = 0.481). The relevance of the sample to the symptom being measured significantly predicted this relationship; that is, the effect was moderate-to-large (Hedge's = 0.671) when excluding comparison subgroups for which the effect was not predicted by the authors. The clinical nature of the sample did not significantly moderate the effect. The experimental studies were generally of higher quality and lower risk of publication bias compared to cross-sectional studies. These findings support the strong transdiagnostic role of death anxiety across numerous disorders. Clinical implications include the potential need to treat death anxiety directly, to maximise long-term therapy benefits.

中文翻译：

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从恐惧到紊乱：死亡焦虑对精神疾病症状影响的荟萃分析


越来越多的研究表明，死亡焦虑可能具有跨诊断性，在精神病理学的发展和症状学中发挥着关键作用。这项荟萃分析研究了死亡焦虑与精神疾病症状之间的关系。总共纳入 104 篇论文，代表来自 99 项研究的横截面数据 (= 24,434) 和来自 11 项研究的实验数据 (= 1372)。横断面研究的荟萃分析表明，死亡焦虑与整体精神疾病症状之间存在中等相关性（= 0.397）。该群体的临床性质成为这种效应的重要调节因素。此外，死亡焦虑与精神疾病症状之间的关系对于临床样本（= 0.580）和焦虑相关症状（= 0.506）比抑郁症更大。对 11 项死亡率显着性研究的其他荟萃分析显示，死亡提醒对临床症状总体上有中等影响（Hedge = 0.481）。样本与所测量症状的相关性显着预测了这种关系；也就是说，当排除作者未预测效果的比较亚组时，效果为中等到大（Hedge's = 0.671）。样本的临床性质并没有显着减轻这种影响。与横断面研究相比，实验研究通常质量更高，发表偏倚风险更低。这些发现支持死亡焦虑在多种疾病中具有强大的跨诊断作用。临床意义包括直接治疗死亡焦虑的潜在需要，以最大限度地提高长期治疗效果。