Garber reviews previous studies of mourning in adolescence, focusing most prominently on the writings of Wolfenstein who asserted that adolescents may be unable to mourn the death of a parent if they have not completed the normal mourning process of psychological separation from parents. Garber cautions that this may not be true. The question is not whether or not adolescents mourn but how they do it. He warns us to be careful not to apply to adolescents what we expect as mourning reactions in childhood or adulthood. He then describes some common patterns observed in adolescents who have lost a parent, such as increased quest for conformity to help undo the profound feeling of "differentness" due to the loss. The youngster is "normal" not despite the loss but because of it, and this is often overlooked as a form of mourning behavior.