ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Suicide and suicidal behaviour are multifaceted events requiring complex solutions. Controlling the environment is a neglected solution, despite strong support for this approach from the World Health Organization (WHO). METHOD: To discuss this approach from a global view, this review is written by authors from various cultures: American, Australian, Canadian, Chinese, Cuban, Dutch, Indian, Irish, Japanese, Lithuanian, Native North American, Russian, and South African. RESULTS: We examine gun control to illustrate the environmental control approach; however, the worldwide diversity of suicide methods calls for diverse responses. Further, controlling the environment encompasses more than restricting the means of suicide, which we illustrate with examples of toned-down media reports and restricted medicine availability. CONCLUSIONS: Controlling the environment may be a viable strategy for preventing suicide, although research shows that few clinicians implement such approaches.
Subject(s)
Cross-Cultural Comparison , Social Environment , Suicide Prevention , Humans , Risk Factors , Suicide/ethnologyABSTRACT
Alcoholism is associated with a vast number of suicides. The most systematic study of suicide among alcoholics is the work of Eli Robins and George Murphy. The suicide notes in these studies have remained unanalyzed to date. The present analysis suggested that these suicide notes of alcoholics did not differ from those of nonalcoholics; core themes in their deaths are unbearable psychological pain, cognitive constriction, indirect expressions, rejection-aggression, and identification-aggression. Although caution is in order in accepting the null hypothesis, we can at least suggest that further study is needed.
Subject(s)
Alcoholism/psychology , Correspondence as Topic , Suicide/psychology , HumansABSTRACT
Suicide is a major mental health problem and public health problem worldwide. Schools and their communities must respond in a comprehensive fashion. Caplan's model of primary, secondary, and tertiary prevention--or prevention, intervention, and postvention--is proposed as a comprehensive response to suicide in youths. Current myths and facts about these fabrications are discussed for each mode of response. Research, clinical suggestions, and a call for further discussion are presented.
Subject(s)
Art , Schools , Suicide Prevention , Humans , Mental Health Services/standards , Mental Health Services/supply & distributionABSTRACT
Personal documents have a significant place in psychological research. Suicide notes, diaries, novels, poems, and so on allow us to better understand the suicidal mind. The works of Sylvia Plath--a poet who killed herself at age 30--are prime examples for such protocol study. This article examines the last 6 months of Plath's poetry, revealing a suicidal malaise. Associating the results to the lives of Cesare Pavese and the case study of Natalie, a Terman-Shneidman subject of the intellectually gifted, the study shows a unit thema that facilitates the process of death. The poems reveal such themes as unbearable pain, loss, and abandonment that likely contributed significantly to death becoming the only solution.
Subject(s)
Famous Persons , Poetry as Topic , Suicide/history , Writing/history , Documentation , History, 20th Century , Humans , Literature, Modern , Poetry as Topic/history , Risk Factors , Suicide/psychology , United StatesABSTRACT
This study of suicide notes involved the deduction of 50 protocol sentences that reflected important aspects of Shneidman's formulations regarding suicide. Independent judges noted the incidence of contents corresponding to the protocol sentences in 33 genuine and 33 simulated notes. Statements that were found significantly and more frequently in genuine notes included the following: the experience of adult trauma such as a calamitous relationship; a rejection; the withdrawal of a significant person resulting in despair; perceiving another as dooming one to the suicide; expressions of ambivalence; feelings of love, hate and other emotions; feelings of helplessness, pessimism and emotional confusion; appearing to be intoxicated by one's overpowering emotions and constricted perceptions; and the communications appearing to have unconscious implications. Statements of "egression" and more logical reasoning were more characteristic of the simulated notes. A frequency count in the genuine notes indicated that many protocol sentences were also very predictive of the content. Implications of the results are discussed.
