Suicide research findings

[Tintypographer]

The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention has some gold data on their website:

What we've learned through research

Discover the top findings from suicide research

afsp.org

This comes from clinical analysis and research on populations in the usa and is not simply anecdotes of anger or frustration for or against suicide:

1. Suicide is related to brain functions that affect decision-making and behavioral control, making it difficult for people to find positive solutions
2. Limiting a person's access to methods of killing themselves dramatically decreases suicide rates in communities
3. Ninety percent of people who die by suicide have an underlying — and potentially treatable — mental health condition
4. Depression, bipolar disorder, and substance use are strongly linked to suicidal thinking and behavior
5. Specific treatments used by mental health professionals — such as Cognitive Behavior Therapy-SP and Dialectical Behavior Therapy — have been proven to help people manage their suicidal ideation and behavior
6. No one takes their life for a single reason. Life stresses combined with known risk factors, such as childhood trauma, substance use — or even chronic physical pain — can contribute to someone taking their own life.
7. Talking to someone about suicide won't "put the idea in their head" — most will be relieved someone starts a conversation
8. Certain medications used to treat depression or stabilize mood have been proven to help people reduce suicidal thoughts and behavior
9. If someone can get through the intense, and short, moment of active suicidal crisis, chances are they will not die by suicide
10. Most people who survive a suicide attempt (85 to 95 percent) go on to engage in life

No where on this list is sanctioned suicide a primary cause of suicide. Being the 12th leading cause of death and second leading cause of death in males over 35 the crisis isn't solvable by angry people shutting down sanctioned suicide and talking about the issue. The data points to access to better mental health for long term problems. It sure would be nice to see someone fighting vigilantly to hold people accountable for mental Healthcare gaps in America.

 

[Euthanza]

Many would prefer to keep freedom and privacy over "mental health" or even "terminal illness". This is a 90/10 probability.

APA and AFSP should really consider well of Thomas Szasz and Kevorkian's thought on this matter.

 

[noaccount]

RE:

Ninety percent of people who die by suicide have an underlying — and potentially treatable — mental health condition

It is really important, here, to question and unpack what exactly they're claiming makes someone's experience of way of thinking a "mental health condition," rather than, say, a spiritual condition, a social-mistreatment condition, a cultural condition or a simple difference-of-opinion between them and a doctor.

There is a good essay about this, "El prejuicio psiquiátrico." Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be another direct translation available but part of it was translated here:


See, also, this example from Youth Rights of how institutions reframe conflict between-people as a "sickness" within the person with the least power in the conflict.

Who Decides What a Mental Disorder Is? - NYRA

The definition of a mental disorder is a “dysfunction in the psychological, biological, or developmental processes underlying mental functioning.” Unfortunately, this definition is vague and leaves much room for debate and criticism. Since it is not entirely clear what “dysfunction” means, the...

www.youthrights.org

 

[AloneInCollege]

and potentially treatable

Specific treatments used by mental health professionals — such as Cognitive Behavior Therapy-SP and Dialectical Behavior Therapy — have been proven to help people manage their suicidal ideation and behavior

Yeah. Sure they do. (Sarcasm)
I'm sure they work for some people, but for me, and I think a lot of us, they don't do squat.

 

[Shu]

Legalize Psychedelics!

 

[Superdeterminist]

Points 5 and 8 seem a bit dishonest. These 'treatments' often fail and are also often unpleasant to take. I don't like how these points have been and may be used to try and force treatments on people. I view such things as having parallels to conversion therapy for gay people.

 

[london3]

I have read all these arguments my whole life and am bored of hearing the same old points.

A lot of people on this forum have tried using conventional ways that society tells us will fix our issues. Yes it might work for some people but how about the people that fall through the cracks? or the people that are simply tired and are at the end of the road?

For those people that want to check out surely society must care enough about them to give them the option to die peacefully?

 

[slushy]

Not super on topic but I don't know that I agree with number 9. I never really got the experience of "suicidal episode" or "brief moment of crisis" or whatever. Maybe it is like that for some people but not for me. Wanting to die is my baseline state, even in my happy moments I feel I'd rather be dead. Consciousness hurts for me

 

[Marktheghost]

Not super on topic but I don't know that I agree with number 9. I never really got the experience of "suicidal episode" or "brief moment of crisis" or whatever. Maybe it is like that for some people but not for me. Wanting to die is my baseline state, even in my happy moments I feel I'd rather be dead. Consciousness hurts for me

Yes I agree. I've wanted to die for years and years. How is that intense and short?

 

[Feeding Pigeons]

2) Limiting a person's access to methods of killing themselves dramatically decreases suicide rates in communities

So the goal is to reduce suicide, not reduce suffering, gotcha.

 

[waiting4thenextbus]

Limiting a person's access to methods of killing themselves dramatically decreases suicide rates in communities

That is 100% a LIE. All that does is make the person feel more trapped and thus MORE SUICIDAL.

In fact, some have said that having the means to a peaceful exit actually gives them some motivation to give life a shot. Thus REDUCING suicidality. Knowing they have the option to quit life actually takes the pressure off, and provides some people the calmness needed to continue.

This is evident when people receive the "Green Light" at Dignitas. Knowing they have the green light helps them stay alive, with the comfort in the back of their mind that they can quit at any time.

 

[Tintypographer]

All:

Thank you for your thoughts on this. Do keep on mind this is data. They have done an analysis with confidence intervals and correlations to show that there is a statistical correlation between each of those points and the outcome they have chosen to measure which is: "if you take a population with suicidal intent and they have those conditions in their life is the statistical population more or less likely to have higher suicide rates"

I'm sure when they talk about access to suicide means they mean "guns in the house" as that is still the number one cause of death by suicide.

I am the first to admit thay I detest cognitive therapy. I dislike it, it hasn't worked for me for years and I detest reframjng. This community is filled with the group for whom those typical therapies do not work. But out there is a cohort of depressed people who have had suicidal ideation that isn't severe clinical and they are helped a great deal by it.

For those who have no actual end I believe thay the options need to be supported for unbelievably expensive medical costs clinical support 1:1 with the best therapists and doctors in the world with no cost. And yes, options to choose to terminate your life which belongs to you.

My point with this summary is that no where in that does it say thay the data proves that sanctioned suicide and forums like it lead to more suicides which the @fixthe26 and @stopsanctionedsuicide claim. All the claims to "we have evidence" or "there is proof that if people have access to this forum they will be recruited to commit suicide". Those are anecdotes without documentation and have no data to back them up. That's not saying they didn't happen.

One could create a hypothesis that asks the question "is a depressed individual with clinically diagnosed suicidal ideation more likely to commit suicide with access to this forum" that one might be hard to get through an institutional review board that looks at studies for ethics but go with me. If so, you would look at data on the percent of peo people with the clinical diagnoses that have committed suicide in a normal population. Then put in all the factors such as access to care, economic and social situations like divorce, trauma, terminal diseases, bullying, LGBT and gender issues and you would build the populations. Then let's say it would take 350 people in a normal population to prove this with confidence intervals, we would monitor at least 350 people and sort them into cohorts and follow their interaction with this forum.

Only after that type of work was finished could you say "interaction with sanctioned suicide forum leads to an increase in the likelihood if suicide in these (xyz) populations.

Otherwise it's all just complete anecdotal crap. A suicide whether it is after the person played a video game, or interacted on this forum, or was subjected to 18 hours of campaign speeches in a row is simply a blip of a single point of data no different than finding a dead unicorn near a pot of gold and assuming that leprechauns kill unicorns.

The data in those studies is actually sound. That organizations mission is the gaussian or poisson curve of all suicides including the tails. Somewhere in the middle of the population of all suicides are people for whom cognitive therapy or removing guns from the house shows a high impact on decreasing the likelihood of suicide. This is real, scientific and proven. It doesn't meant its the right therapy for everyone and I would say that a clinician looking for a unique and deserving population should turn their lens at this site. We very likely have a tail end of the curve of people for whom conventional medicine and therapy doesn't work. And thay is both ok and important. We are important. We have a problem thay current medical therapy can't fix and an outcome of thay lack of treatment is suicide. That's important to acknowledge.

 

[FuneralCry]

I think that the only thing that could reduce suicide is to focus and remove what is causing people to be suicidal in the first place. Nothing could ever make me want to live personally though and I believe that in many cases it would be impossible to do that. Removing methods and censoring suicide information will just make people more desperate. Society just needs to allow euthanasia. Even if things could get better for someone, they still have no obligation to live. It is a personal decision when to leave.

Euthanasia should not be just restricted to those 'suffering unbearably', it should be an option for all. I feel like suicide is inevitable in a world like this no matter what. Some people simply do not want to exist until old age and there is nothing really wrong with deciding to die as well. No one should be forced to live.

 

[noaccount]

All:

Thank you for your thoughts on this. Do keep on mind this is data. They have done an analysis with confidence intervals and correlations to show that there is a statistical correlation between each of those points and the outcome they have chosen to measure which is: "if you take a population with suicidal intent and they have those conditions in their life is the statistical population more or less likely to have higher suicide rates"

I'm sure when they talk about access to suicide means they mean "guns in the house" as that is still the number one cause of death by suicide.

I am the first to admit thay I detest cognitive therapy. I dislike it, it hasn't worked for me for years and I detest reframjng. This community is filled with the group for whom those typical therapies do not work. But out there is a cohort of depressed people who have had suicidal ideation that isn't severe clinical and they are helped a great deal by it.

For those who have no actual end I believe thay the options need to be supported for unbelievably expensive medical costs clinical support 1:1 with the best therapists and doctors in the world with no cost. And yes, options to choose to terminate your life which belongs to you.

My point with this summary is that no where in that does it say thay the data proves that sanctioned suicide and forums like it lead to more suicides which the @fixthe26 and @stopsanctionedsuicide claim. All the claims to "we have evidence" or "there is proof that if people have access to this forum they will be recruited to commit suicide". Those are anecdotes without documentation and have no data to back them up. That's not saying they didn't happen.

One could create a hypothesis that asks the question "is a depressed individual with clinically diagnosed suicidal ideation more likely to commit suicide with access to this forum" that one might be hard to get through an institutional review board that looks at studies for ethics but go with me. If so, you would look at data on the percent of peo people with the clinical diagnoses that have committed suicide in a normal population. Then put in all the factors such as access to care, economic and social situations like divorce, trauma, terminal diseases, bullying, LGBT and gender issues and you would build the populations. Then let's say it would take 350 people in a normal population to prove this with confidence intervals, we would monitor at least 350 people and sort them into cohorts and follow their interaction with this forum.

Only after that type of work was finished could you say "interaction with sanctioned suicide forum leads to an increase in the likelihood if suicide in these (xyz) populations.

Otherwise it's all just complete anecdotal crap. A suicide whether it is after the person played a video game, or interacted on this forum, or was subjected to 18 hours of campaign speeches in a row is simply a blip of a single point of data no different than finding a dead unicorn near a pot of gold and assuming that leprechauns kill unicorns.

The data in those studies is actually sound. That organizations mission is the gaussian or poisson curve of all suicides including the tails. Somewhere in the middle of the population of all suicides are people for whom cognitive therapy or removing guns from the house shows a high impact on decreasing the likelihood of suicide. This is real, scientific and proven. It doesn't meant its the right therapy for everyone and I would say that a clinician looking for a unique and deserving population should turn their lens at this site. We very likely have a tail end of the curve of people for whom conventional medicine and therapy doesn't work. And thay is both ok and important. We are important. We have a problem thay current medical therapy can't fix and an outcome of thay lack of treatment is suicide. That's important to acknowledge.

Even if removing guns decreases suicide rates, that's not really a justification for codifying that into federal law - we must keep in mind who is enforcing the laws and what their intentions and biases will be, which will of course corrupt and change the effects of these laws (they moved to disarm the Panthers and then actively helped the Proud Boys arm up), as well as, well, we're pro-choice here.

On access to treatment, it's relevant to look at how suicide rates go up once people are psychiatrically detained, including among people who were not suicidal when/before they were detained.

 

[Musketeer]

This is why i fought for so many years to get it legalized in my country, barring that i will leave it to others when i die. More kind and compassionate people will come after my death to fight the good fight. Until then we fight.

 

[Tintypographer]

Thanks all:

I actually don't know if they meant removing guns. The statistics simply showed that for a population, removing the access to "lethal means" decreased suicide rates. I only inferred guns. The data still showed a decrease in suicides for that overall population.

I think that the data is still valid for the population and hypothesis they put together. Assuming 100000 people who are suicidal and suffering from depression, if they treat the whole population with those suggestions there would be a decrease in suicides compared to leaving the population alone. Obviously the methods wouldn't work for everyone any more than a specific chemo treatment would treat all forms of cancer.

I absolutely respect that cognitive therapy works for some. It just hasn't worked for me. I fall under the umbrella of clinical severe depressive disorder with chronic suicidal ideation. I'm treatment resistant and a danger to myself during periods of hopelessness and intense despair. I can state that having more therapy wouldn't help me so that's part of the negative population there. But removing any means for me to kill myself would decrease my likelihood of killing myself. So there is that.

Thats the tough part about clinical studies. They are statistical and controlled. They are designed to either prove or disprove a hypothesis not provide a proof of a concept. I can prove that temperatures go up or down or that energy is conserved. I can also prove that molecules do things in biochemistry. But generalized treatments and therapies are not absolute because of the variability of all the things that make up psychology and emotions.

 

[Dot]

Wld stll b intrstd 2 C th/ sampl & recruitmnt & methdlgy fr th/ cogntve thrpy claims

 

[Cathy Ames]

Thats the tough part about clinical studies. They are statistical and controlled. They are designed to either prove or disprove a hypothesis not provide a proof of a concept. I can prove that temperatures go up or down or that energy is conserved. I can also prove that molecules do things in biochemistry. But generalized treatments and therapies are not absolute because of the variability of all the things that make up psychology and emotions.

Okay, so my problem with this data is that the web site link gave no bibliography, names of authors, descriptions of methodology, and etc.--or perhaps I didn't try hard enough to find them. You're here telling me that the data are solid, but based on what? Have you seen the studies? I assumed these were epidemiological type studies (perhaps gleaned from medical records? or surveys?), but here you are saying they were "clinical studies," i.e. studies with an intervention and a placebo or negative control. That makes it even MORE important to see the methodology so as to know whether it is even applicable to real world situations. This whole thing makes me extremely uncomfortable.

If the data are from surveys and there was no survey question related to web sites, then the results only indicate that a causal link has not been shown... yet.

 

[Dot]

Clincl trls r oftn selctve in thr rcruitmnt 2 rduce cnfoundng/intrfering vriables & slf wll alwys b skeptcl of rsults syng tht thy 'prve' n.e.thng

 

[Tintypographer]

Since that is a material piece geared toward the non clinical audience there is not a link directly to the studies.

I will get the citations and post them here for review.