Kõlves / Sisask / Värnik Advancing Suicide Research

2021
ISBN: 978-1-61334-559-7
Verlag: Hogrefe Publishing
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 310 Seiten

Contribute to suicide prevention by using appropriate research methods!
This is a one-stop book for anyone who wants an overview of the research approaches and issues concerning suicide. Leading researchers provide a comprehensive toolbox of the current best practices in suicide research, showing you how to conduct high-quality research using quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods in suicide-prevention from a public health perspective. Other aspects that are crucial to effective suicide research are also presented, including the proper use of epidemiological measures and study designs, definitional issues, historical background, and ethical aspects.

The clearly written chapters include both theoretical and practical information along with specific examples from different areas of suicide research and prevention, and also explore essential topics such as psychological autopsies, health economics, and technological advances. This volume is ideal for researchers, students, and academics interested in suicide research, as well as policy makers, clinicians, and other practitioners.

Zielgruppe

Mental health professionals, epidemiologists, social policy makers, researchers, and students.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Kõlves, Kairi

Sisask, Merike

Värnik, Peeter

Värnik, Airi

De Leo, Diego

Fachgebiete

• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften: Forschung und Information Forschungsmethodik, Wissenschaftliche Ausstattung
• Sozialwissenschaften Psychologie Psychotherapie / Klinische Psychologie Psychopathologie
• Medizin | Veterinärmedizin Medizin | Public Health | Pharmazie | Zahnmedizin Medizinische Fachgebiete Psychiatrie, Sozialpsychiatrie, Suchttherapie

Leseproben

|1|Chapter 1
The Roots of Suicide Research
From Historical Underpinnings to Frameworks for Modern Suicide Research Morton M. Silverman Summary This chapter will briefly summarize the historical contributions to our understanding of suicide and suicidal behaviors, with a focus on the last 3 centuries. Political, legal, and theological contributions have shaped our approaches to the investigation of suicidal behaviors, as have the contributions of emerging scientific methods and theories. Key themes, findings, and lines of research over the centuries will be compared, emphasizing their influences on the foundations and development of modern suicide research. Various lines of research and scientific paradigms have contributed to many aspects of the understanding and prevention of suicidal behaviors, including epidemiology, risk detection, concepts of clinical course, and approaches to treatment, evaluation, and follow-up. Suicide and self-destructive behaviors have been chronicled as far back as the Old Testament. However, scientific approaches to understanding suicide and its many vicissitudes are a much later development. The history of suicide and suicide-related behaviors, as well as the early investigations into their etiology, pathogenesis, and expression, are briefly summarized below. The scientific study of suicide began at the end of the 19th century, but has only increased exponentially in the last 60 years. Furthermore, there has been an explosion of meta-analyses of studies that focus on all forms of suicide-related thoughts and behaviors, including the components used for identification and assessment, the efficacy of interventions, and the methodologies to study different aspects of suicide-related behaviors. No one risk factor or set of risk factors can explain why a particular individual will die by suicide (Franklin et al., 2017). No one theory can explain the full range of self-injurious or suicidal behaviors. No one individual approach will be sufficient in preventing death by suicide. Understanding its development, expression, and resolution cannot be reduced to a small set of variables. No single scientific discipline can address the complex challenge of understanding the risk for suicidal behaviors, as suicide is the end product of a complex interplay of neurobiological, psychological, and social processes (O’Connor & Portzky, 2018b). As a behavior, suicide-related phenomena have precursors, but just as suicide-related behaviors have different manifestations and expressions, so do the precursors (Robinson & Pirkis, 2014). |2|Foundations of Suicide Research
Suicide research owes its foundation and approaches to many related research disciplines and associated investigations, including psychology, psychiatry, medicine, sociology, theology, social work, public health, epidemiology, traditional statistics, and implementation science. The range of research areas includes, but is not limited to, risk assessment studies (assessment and classification of suicide risk); epidemiological studies (rates, risk factors, and protective factors); intervention studies (general intervention issues and methods, practice guidelines, efficacy of universal interventions, efficacy of selective interventions, and efficacy of indicated interventions); evaluation of policies, programs, and services; biological research (neurobiology and genetics); social science (social forces and economic determinants); media studies; nomenclature and classification studies; implementation science; etc. This brief overview of the history of suicide owes a great deal to the published works of scholars who have extensively studied and critiqued available treatises and historical documents (Anderson, 1987; Berrios & Mohanna, 1990; Goldney & Schioldann, 2002; MacDonald & Murphy, 1990; Minois, 1995/1999; Murray, 1998; Tondo, 2014; van Hooff, 2000). The interested reader is encouraged to access these texts and chapters for a much more detailed and richer understanding of the history of investigations and writings about suicide, especially in Western cultures. In this brief overview of the historical underpinnings for modern suicide research, the main focus is on the publications and philosophical perspectives that specifically relate to death by suicide before 1900 (Minois, 1995/1999). A Brief History of Suicide in Antiquity and Western Cultures up to 1800
References to suicide are found in the Old Testament of the Bible and appear in almost every cultures’ oral and written histories. However, the purpose of this brief review is to highlight some key events that have served as the impetus for the later development of the field of suicidology, and, in particular, the development and evolution of suicide research. Hence, the selection of time periods and countries is rather eclectic. From as far back as ancient Greece, suicide was not considered acceptable. From the 4th century BC, suicidal decedents were usually denied burial or traditional preburial preparation or cremation, and were considered to have committed a grievously antisocial act. Only those deaths by suicides in which it was possible to find a sufficient reason for self-destruction were deemed comprehensible (e.g., heroism, love-rejection, or serious or painful illness). The standard of being understandable was considered the key to assessing suicide to be a justified action (Tondo, 2014). Judgments concerning suicide changed when ancient Greek philosophers became interested in the primacy of reason over the emotions. They based their prohibition of suicide primarily based on its incomprehensibility or irrationality, and it was viewed as an aberration against the natural order to survive. Emotion-driven behaviors became a focus of attention and resulted in laws and customs imposing limits on the expression of such behaviors. To this day, the quest to remains understand and explain self-destructive behaviors from a rational and/or emotional perspective. Of note is the fact that Plato (424–347 BC) was opposed to suicide, because he claimed that men are social individuals with a responsibility to others. Aristotle (384–322 BC) |3|disapproved of suicide because he saw it as a transgression against a civic duty and as an act of cowardice. Here we see the beginnings of a sociological perspective to explain suicide. The two prominent philosophical schools of ancient Rome, Epicureanism and Stoicism, approved of suicide, but for different reasons. The Epicureans believed that the goal of man was the pursuit of happiness, and when this could not be achieved, life lost its purpose. The Stoics placed reason, virtue, and morality above pleasure and common interests, sometimes to the point of reaching a state of detachment and a lack of interest in life (Tondo, 2014). In medieval England, laws against suicide were promulgated in AD 967, including the distinction maintained over the centuries between those who died by suicide when of sound mind and those who were insane. Suicide was not considered a sinful or criminal act in cases of insanity. In Italy, Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) condemned suicide because it was an act against nature and against the benevolence we should have toward ourselves, and he therefore considered it to be a mortal sin. It was also seen as an insult against the community to which we belong and to which we have duties. Finally, it represents an act of defiance and rejection of the laws of God who gave us life and is the only one who may decide to take it back (Tondo, 2014). During the Renaissance (14th–17th centuries), the growing interest in humanism resulted in frank admiration for suicide in which intellectuals found an implicit message of freedom. The Protestant Reformation stimulated growth of individual thinking and efforts to set aside the rules and rigidity of the Catholic Church, leading to a more liberal and questioning attitude toward suicide. Of note is that the Anglican clergyman John Donne (1572–1631), in his essay on the topic of violent death (published after his death, in 1647), wrote about the paradox that self-murder is not a sin...