Suchergebnisse

Globally, older adults have higher suicide rates than other age-groups. However, it is predominantly men who die of suicide in late adulthood, with variability by culture. In the United States, European-descent men are overrepresented among suicide decedents. In this article, theories and evidence about aging adversities, individual dispositions, and cultural influences were evaluated for their potential to explain the suicide vulnerability of European-descent older men. Aging adversities were not found to account for these men's suicide proneness. European-descent older men are exposed to less severe aging adversities than older women or ethnic-minority men—though they may be more impacted by them. Rigidity in coping and in sense of self, consistent with hegemonic-masculinity scripts, emerged as individual-level clues. The indignities-of-aging and the masculinity-of-suicide scripts may be cultural influences. This analysis shows how consideration of masculinities and suicide scripts expands our understanding of older men's suicide as well as, likely, our tools for its prevention.

Abstract. Background: The literature on Muslim women's suicidality has been growing. Comprehensive reviews are, however, unavailable, and theory needs development. Aims: This article reviews and integrates theories and findings about Muslim women's suicidality. Method: Two databases (PsycINFO and Web of Science) were searched for publications about Muslim women's suicidality. Results: There is significant variability in Muslim women's patterns of suicidality across Muslim-majority communities and countries. Muslim women represent half to nearly all cases of nonfatal suicidal behavior. According to the official records of Muslim-majority countries, women's suicide mortality is lower than that of men. Community studies, however, show that in some areas, Muslim women have significantly higher suicide rates than Muslim men. Both nonfatal and fatal suicidal behaviors are most common among uneducated and poor rural young women. Muslim women's typical suicide methods vary by locale, and include self-burning, hanging, and poisoning. With regard to contexts and meanings, a recurring female script is that of suicidality as protest against and desperate escape from the oppressive regulation as well as the abuse many women endure within their families and societies. Conclusion: Understanding and preventing Muslim women's suicidality, and the socially sanctioned oppression it is often a response to, require system-level – not just individual-level – analyses and interventions as well as a human rights perspective.

This longitudinal study examined academic self‐efficacy and performance among Science/Technology/Engineering/Math (STEM) majors who are underrepresented in STEM education and occupations; i.e., women, specific ethnic minorities, and low‐socioeconomic status (SES) individuals. Performance on academic tests and self‐perceptions of academic skills were assessed at admission and graduation from a STEM mentoring program. At admission, women perceived themselves as academically weaker than men despite similar academic performance. However, by graduation, women's academic self‐efficacy was equivalent to men's. In addition, students with double STEM‐minority statuses, by ethnicity and SES, had lower academic self‐efficacy and performance than d id students with single STEM‐minority status. Exploratory analyses of change over time by ethnic/SES groups showed varying patterns of change that depended on the outcome variable. This study's finding of an increase in academic self‐efficacy for women and students with STEM‐minority status by both ethnicity and SES at graduation from a mentoring program is perhaps an indication of the positive impact of mentoring. The mixed findings at program completion for students with single versus double STEM‐minority status call for attention to the complex relationship between social disadvantage, academic self‐efficacy, and academic performance.

Abstract: Background: There is substantial variability, by culture, in suicide rates, and also in suicide beliefs and attitudes. Suicide beliefs and attitudes predict actual suicidality. They also are elements of cultural scripts of suicide. Most suicide-scripts research has been conducted in Anglophone countries. Aims: This study investigates women's and men's suicide scripts in Italy. Methods: Italy's suicide scripts, including beliefs about what causes suicide, were explored via analyses of newspaper stories ( N = 923) of women's and men's suicides. Results: Italian newspapers mostly featured men's suicide stories, consistent with Italian men's higher suicide mortality. Women's suicide was narrated as an unexpected act signaling personal (e.g., emotional and private-relationship) problems. By contrast, men's suicide was framed as relatively understandable response to serious public-life/social adversities (e.g., an economic downturn), and as a death of legitimate despair. Limitations: Social media suicide stories were not included in this study. Conclusion: In Italy, as in several countries with higher male suicide mortality, female suicide is psychologized and considered irrational while male suicide is viewed as a symptom of serious public-life/social problems, and therefore as deserving respect and empathy. The preference for social explanations of male suicide, together with the empathic attitudes, may contribute to male suicide being relatively more permissible and less stigmatized, and therefore also to men's higher suicide mortality.

In 2001 several U.S. government agencies and health organizations, including the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the American Association of Suicidology and the Annenberg Public Policy Center, published consensus recommendations for the media reporting of suicide. This study evaluated whether these guidelines were followed in U.S. newspapers articles on suicide published in 2002 and 2003. We examined articles featuring individual cases of suicidal behavior (N = 157) published in a nationally representative sample of 968 local and national newspapers. Our main finding is that U.S. newspaper suicide coverage did not consistently reflect the influence of the media guidelines in the two years following their publication. On the positive side, a minority (19%) of stories included inappropriate imagery. On the negative side, suicide stories often detailed suicide method (56% of stories) and location (58%) but rarely provided information about warning signs and risk factors (1% of stories), the role of depression (4%), the role of alcohol (2%), and prevention resources (6%). Our findings, together with previous evidence, suggest the need for sustained dialogue and collaboration with the media about the responsible reporting of suicide.

Abstract. Background: Lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) youth are more likely to report suicidal thoughts and/or behavior (STB) than heterosexual youth. The elevated suicidality of LGB youth is not fully accounted for by sexual-minority stress, according to a meta-analysis. A less-tested explanation is that suicidality has become an expected idiom of LGB youth distress. This explanation is consistent with suicide script theory and evidence that suicidal behavior is most likely when it is relatively acceptable. Aims: Building on suicide script theory and evidence, two studies were designed: one of LGB youth attitudes about suicidal behavior, and the other of LGB youth attitudes about suicidal individuals. Method: Surveys of LGB and heterosexual youth (total N = 300; M age = 20; 51% female) were conducted. Results: LGB youth were more accepting of and empathic toward suicidal behavior than heterosexual youth. They also viewed suicidal individuals as more emotionally adjusted. Limitations: Attitudes were not examined by sexual-minority subgroups. Conclusion: LGB youth's understanding attitudes may translate into less judgmental behavior toward suicidal peers, but also into normalizing suicidality as a way to express distress and cope with life problems. There may be utility in evaluating LGB youth suicide attitudes in suicide prevention initiatives.