Closure (psychology)

In psychology, closure may refer to the state of experiencing an emotional conclusion to a difficult life event, such as the breakdown of a close interpersonal relationship or the death of loved one. People may behave in a certain way or perform certain rituals to help "bring closure" following such events. In many other cases, "closure" may only come about through the passage of time (as in "time heals all wounds"). In many cases, especially victims of violent crime, it is said that closure never comes, and that the wound is not healed, but moved on from.

The term may also be applied to the supposed collective psyche of a society. It rose to worldwide prominence in this sense when calls to achieve 'closure' were used to curtail the process of recounting votes in the United States presidential election, 2000.

The term is also used in social construction of technology (SCOT) as described by Wiebe Bijker, Trevor Pinch and John Law, among others. The focus of SCOT-studies is to examine the ways in which technological artifacts, which are part of broader technological systems, are socially constructed by so-called relevant social groups or actors. This in essence often means explaining why an artifact looks the way it does. Closure here refers to the end of the process of social construction, meaning that the artifact no longer goes through dramatic changes. Bijker has exemplified this with the development of the bicycle.

References (closure in technological change)

 * Pinch, T. J., & Bijker, W. E. (1984). The Social Construction of Facts and Artefacts: or How the Sociology of Science and the Sociology of Technology might Benefit Each Other. Social Studies of Science, 14, 388–441.
 * Misa, T. J. (1992). Controversy and Closure in Technological Change: Constructing "Steel". In W. E. Bijker & J. Law (Eds.), Shaping Technology/Building Society: Studies in Sociotechnical Change (pp. 109–139). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press.