diff --git a/decoding_json.go b/decoding_json.go
index 77fddc9..1423284 100644
--- a/decoding_json.go
+++ b/decoding_json.go
@@ -25,6 +25,9 @@ var ItemTyperFunc TyperFn = GetItemByType
 // JSONItemUnmarshal can be set externally to populate a custom object based on its type
 var JSONItemUnmarshal JSONUnmarshalerFn = nil
 
+// NotEmptyChecker checks if an object is empty
+var NotEmptyChecker NotEmptyCheckerFn = NotEmpty
+
 // TyperFn is the type of the function which returns an Item struct instance
 // for a specific ActivityVocabularyType
 type TyperFn func(ActivityVocabularyType) (Item, error)
@@ -33,6 +36,9 @@ type TyperFn func(ActivityVocabularyType) (Item, error)
 // that the current package doesn't know about.
 type JSONUnmarshalerFn func(ActivityVocabularyType, *fastjson.Value, Item) error
 
+// NotEmptyCheckerFn is the type of a function that checks if an object is empty
+type NotEmptyCheckerFn func(Item) bool
+
 func JSONGetID(val *fastjson.Value) ID {
 	i := val.Get("id").GetStringBytes()
 	return ID(i)
@@ -186,6 +192,7 @@ func JSONLoadItem(val *fastjson.Value) (Item, error) {
 	if err != nil || IsNil(i) {
 		return nil, nil
 	}
+	var empty = func(i Item) bool { return !NotEmptyChecker(i) }
 
 	switch typ {
 	case "":
@@ -258,6 +265,9 @@ func JSONLoadItem(val *fastjson.Value) (Item, error) {
 	if err != nil {
 		return nil, err
 	}
+	if empty(i) {
+		return nil, nil
+	}
 
 	return i, nil
 }