I had gone to bed, and I just, I felt like there was someone in the room, and I felt this sensation on my scalp, you know, where [grandmother] used to, she always used to love like kind of playing with our hair, my sister and I, I just felt this sensation, and I remember sitting up in bed and saying,ā[Grandmother], I know youāre there.ā And um, and I said, āIām not scared.ā And āI know youāre just trying to tell me everything's all right.ā And, actually, it was actually quite comforting in a way. And um just feeling that sort of sense she was there. It was almost like she was saying goodbye, because I wasnāt there when she actually died. It was almost like she just come to say, āYouāll be fine. Everything will be fine. And I just want to say bye-bye.ā And it was actually it was a really nice feeling. (Elaine; bereaved interview participant; previously unpublished data)
Introduction: A Common Yet Controversial Phenomenon
The above quotation by Elaine, who took part in a research interview about sensory experiences of deceased loved ones (Steffen & Coyle, 2011), stands for many similar reports from bereaved people who have experienced the presence of a deceased loved one through sensory perception or a feeling of near-physical presence. The above instance includes many elements that may be part of such an experience, for example, a sensory perception such as being touched by her deceased grandmother, a difficult-to-define feeling of her presence, and an understanding of the possible meanings of her presence, such as her grandmother coming to say goodbye and reassuring Elaine. Furthermore, the comforting impact of the experience is emphasized. Later in the interview, Elaine also explored how this experience fitted with her global belief system and how, while remaining somewhat sceptical, she felt that this suggested there is an afterlife and that her grandmother, like a benevolent spiritual being, is watching over her.
Experiences like the one recounted by Elaine are not at all rare. Forty-seven to eighty-two percent of bereaved individuals report having had a sensory or quasi-sensory experience of the deceased (SED) involving any one or several of the five senses and/or a more difficult-to-define feeling or awareness of the deceased's presence (Datson & Marwit, 1997; Grimby, 1998; Hayes & Leudar, 2016; Kamp et al., 2020; Rees, 1971). SED first became the focus of systematic scientific interest in the late 19th century when they were explored as part of a census on hallucinations (Sidgwick, Johnson, Myers, Podmore, & Sidgwick, 1894). Much of the research since then has taken place in Western contexts, but SED have also been reported across many cultures (Sabucedo, Evans, & Hayes, 2020), and recent decades have seen a general increase in SED research, including in non-Western cultures (e.g., Chan et al., 2005; Shimizu, Kikuchi, Kobayashi, & Kato, 2017). However, for much of the 20th century, SED were mostly researched or written about from Western and particularly psychiatric perspectives, for example, viewing SED as symptoms of pathological grief and getting in the way of the clinical goal of letting go and moving on in grief (Freud, 1917; Parkes, 1972) or, from an attachment theory perspective, as getting in the way of integrating the loss in adaptive ways (Field, 2006). Drawing on cross-cultural research that suggested the potential adaptiveness of SED in non-Western cultures such as Japan (Yamamoto, Okonogi, Iwasaki, & Yoshimura, 1969), a radical shift in perspective occurred toward the end of the 20th century with the seminal publication of Continuing Bonds: New Understandings of Grief (Klass, Silverman, & Nickman, 1996), a book that marked a paradigm shift in bereavement scholarship. Grounded in qualitative research, SED were shown to be often comforting and helpful events welcomed by perceivers (e.g., Conant, 1996). SED could thus be understood as expressions of an ongoing dynamic relationship with the deceased rather than as pathological grief or unresolved loss. In the years following the publication by Klass et al., further qualitative research into the phenomenology and meanings of SED was conducted (Keen, Murray, & Payne, 2013b; Steffen & Coyle, 2011), and quantitative research focused on trying to establish when SED or continuing bonds broadly might be more or less adaptive (e.g., Field & Filanosky, 2010; Neimeyer, Baldwin, & Gillies, 2006).
What Are Sensory and Quasi-Sensory Experiences of the Deceased Like?
Sensory experiences of the deceased have been reported as occurring through all of the five senses, sometimes through only one of the senses and at other times through multiple senses (Kamp, Steffen, Alderson-Day, et al., 2020). For example, the voice of the deceased may be heard or there may be a visual perception of the deceased in combination with, for example, a sound or feeling of touch (e.g., Hayes & Leudar, 2016; Keen et al., 2013b; Steffen & Coyle, 2011). Experiences can be distinct and clear or vague and diffuse, involving a whole or partial perceptual experience of the deceased. For instance, the deceased may be seen in full body, or only a glimpse of their face may be seen (Woollacott, Roe, Cooper, Lorimer, & Elsaesser, 2021). The experience can also involve indirect perception such as hearing the footsteps of the deceased or the smell of tobacco or perfume as characteristic of them when they were alive (e.g., Sormanti & August, 1997; Steffen & Coyle, 2017). While taste experiences are very rare, they do occur and can, for example, involve the taste of a favorite dish associated with the deceased (e.g., Hayes, 2011).
The most commonly reported experience of the deceased tends to be, however, not a sensory experience as such but, what has been called, a quasi-sensory experience of presence (Steffen & Coyle, 2011), which is difficult to pin down in terms of one of the five senses but which is clearly felt as an awareness or feeling of the deceased somehow being there (Bennett & Bennett, 2000; Datson & Marwit, 1997; Grimby, 1998). The feeling of presence frequently involves a sense of location of the deceased (Woollacott et al., 2021), for example, just above one's shoulder or to one side of the bereaved. But it can also be a general awareness of the deceased being somehow around or the griever feeling watched over by the deceased from a more distant location, such as heaven (Bennett, & Bennett, 2000; Conant, 1996; Steffen & Coyle, 2011). The latter kind of experience also points to a continuum between SED and feelings of connection between the deceased and the bereaved person that are of a less sensory or tangible nature (e.g., Ratcliffe, 2020). Very often sensory experiences and presence occur in combination. Elaine's experience of feeling her grandmother caressing her as well as sensing her presence in the room illustrates this (see also Table 12.1).
Table 12.1 Prevalence, perceptual content, and examples of sensory and quasi-sensory experiences of the deceased Sensory modality-prevalence range | Perceptual content | Examples reported by perceivers |
Sense of presence | The deceased as felt presence that can be located in space | āI just completely relaxed inside this car [.] He was with me. It was as if he was sitting next to me reallyā (Steffen & Coyle, 2011). |
The deceased as non-specific yet āfeltā presence/awareness | āSometimes I just know he's around, you know. And other times I donāt. But when I do think that he is it's such a strong feeling that Iām sure of itā (Tyson-Rawson, 1996). |
Auditory SED | Hearing the voice of the deceased | āAnd I heard my grandma say, āit's at the back, it's at the backā. And [.] as I looked toward the back, I could see there was like a, thing that needed, needed to be turnedā (Hayes & Leudar, 2016). |
Hearing sounds of the deceased | āIāve heard odd noises once and once I was frightened. I said, āStop that dad,ā and it did stopā (Keen et al., 2013). |
Visual SED | Seeing the deceased in full figure | āAnd all of a sudden, from nowhere, he appeared! I mean, I just ā a vision of him was right in front of me. I mean, it lasted a split second. But, it was thereā (Conant, 1996). |
Partial visual perception of the deceased | āWell this was an eye and a nostril, it filled the whole of my, my vision bit there, my vision that you can see, and like a nostril, and it was all, sort of, floaty and I thought that ... |
