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Moderate day-to-day U.S. suicides monthly 1999-April 2024. Blue dots display November, December, and January. Credit score: CDC, Annenberg Public Coverage Heart
Over the last 25 years that we have got been learning this phenomenon, in simply over a 3rd (9 years or 36%) have we discovered extra debunking of the parable than reinforce for it. In spite of years of debunking via psychological well being researchers, reporters, and others, the misperception that individuals are much more likely to die via suicide over the vacations has proven outstanding endurance.
“The persistence of this myth suggests that its hold on the public’s imagination is difficult to undo. Supporting the myth serves no useful purpose and may have a contagious effect on vulnerable people who are experiencing a crisis and contemplating suicide during the holidays.”
Associating the vacations with suicide
A Denver Publish tale on Dec. 8, 2023, relating to 4 murder-suicides in two weeks, quoted a neighborhood social-services respectable as pronouncing that the “ongoing holiday season could be part of the reason why.”
A columnist for the Advertiser-Gleam, in Guntersville, Ala., wrote on Nov. 28, 2023, about taking his annual go back and forth to chop the Christmas tree. The columnist wrote: “Statistics inform us that during the holiday season the number of suicides increase. It is easy to see why. Each year we mark another year has passed and we are a year older. Each year brings the loss of some we love and new additions that we have come to love…”
Northern Sentry, the Minot Air Pressure Base (N.D.) newspaper, printed a tale from Air & Area Forces Mag pronouncing that the Air Pressure base used to be investigating the deaths of 3 airmen in a single month. The Dec. 1, 2023, tale quoted an army partner as telling the Minot Day by day Information that the “holidays are such a vulnerable time for people, where we have some of the highest rates of suicide in general.”
The proportion of holiday-season newspaper tales supporting the holiday-suicide fable from 1999-2000 thru 2023-24. Credit score: Annenberg Public Coverage Heart
Our media research additionally discovered examples of reports that debunked the parable. Amongst those:
Within the Dec. 21, 2023, tale, “These tips will help you navigate your holiday blues,” the weekly New Pittsburgh Courier quoted a psychological well being skilled from the Washington College College of Drugs, in St. Louis, who stated, “It’s unfortunate that the myth that suicide rates increase around the winter holidays continues since studies have shown that’s just not the case… let’s not sensationalize the risk of suicide, or give people the impression that this is a time when more people are dying by suicide.” The tale added, “In her view, emphasizing this false risk can be harmful, potentially influencing those who are struggling and making it seem like a more prevalent occurrence.”
A column via Dr. Barton Goldsmith within the Grand Island (Neb.) Impartial, on Dec. 9, 2023, starts: “There has been a long-standing myth that suicide rates increase over the holiday season. According to the Mayo Clinic this is completely false. What is true is that the rates of depression and stress do increase. Here are 10 solid tools to help you and deal if Santa also brings you some holiday blues.”
“As these two stories observe, the holiday blues are a real phenomenon that might require attention to loved ones who might be sad at this time of year,” Romer stated. “People may feel sadness around the holidays for many different reasons. There’s no need to give people the false impression that others are dying by suicide, when that could actually lead to contagion.”
The suggestions, which have been advanced via journalism, psychological well being, public well being, and suicide-prevention teams, along side the Annenberg Public Coverage Heart, say that journalists must seek the advice of dependable resources such because the Facilities for Illness Keep an eye on and Prevention (CDC).
Newshounds serving to to dispel the holiday-suicide fable too can supply precious sources for readers who’re in or know of anyone who’s in a possible disaster, together with the ones on the Suicide Prevention Useful resource Heart, the Nationwide Institute of Psychological Well being, and the Substance Abuse and Psychological Well being Products and services Management, or SAMHSA.
The seasonal nature of the suicide charge
CDC information display that the months with the bottom moderate day-to-day suicide charges are most often within the fall and wintry weather: November, December, and January.
In 2023, the final complete 12 months for which CDC information are to be had, December had the bottom moderate day-to-day suicide charge—it used to be twelfth some of the months, and November used to be eleventh. January got here in fifth. The months with the easiest charges had been August (1st) and July (2d).
Wisdom of the suicide and disaster lifeline quantity; ASAPH Survey January 2023—September 2024. Credit score: Annenberg Public Coverage Heart
This seasonal development for the suicide charge holds true in Australia, too. Romer final 12 months performed an research of moderate day-to-day suicide charges over a dozen years in Australia. He discovered that the wintry weather months in Australia had decrease suicide charges, very similar to the USA. Since Australia is within the southern hemisphere, the month with the bottom moderate day-to-day suicide charge used to be June, which is the start of wintry weather there.
In freeing the Australian information final 12 months, Romer stated, “This helps to explain the lower suicide rate we see here in December—it’s mostly due to the onset of the winter season. Psychologically, because of the shorter and gloomier days of winter in the U.S., we tend to associate them with suicide. But that’s not what happens in reality.”
Now not sufficient other folks find out about 988
A big executive initiative to lend a hand prone other folks happened in July 2022, when the Nationwide Suicide Prevention Lifeline used to be renamed the 988 Suicide & Disaster Lifeline, and 988 used to be applied as its three-digit national telephone quantity. Annenberg Public Coverage Heart surveys have discovered that familiarity with the 988 quantity is rising slowly, and nonetheless too few other folks understand it.
As of the September 2024 nationally consultant panel survey, simply 15% of U.S. adults are conversant in the suicide lifeline, up from 11% in August 2023. Those are individuals who stated they had been conscious that there’s a suicide lifeline quantity and, in an open-ended structure, stated it’s 988.
“The help that can be found at the 988 helpline can only save lives if those in need and their loved ones and friends know the number,” Kathleen Corridor Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Coverage Heart, stated final month when this discovering used to be launched. “When 988 is as readily recalled as 911, the nation will have cause to celebrate.”
How we performed this media find out about
APPC’s Sam Fox supervised the coding of the tales, running with Lauren Hawkins. The coding used to be executed via Penn scholars Kendall Allen, Nicholas Bausenwein, Ginger Fontenot, Sienna Horvath, Nia Peterson, and Dylan Walker, who’re with APPC’s Annenberg Well being and Possibility Communique Institute. Shawn Patterson created the knowledge figures.
Supplied via
Annenberg Public Coverage Heart of the College of Pennsylvania
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Suicide charge is low right through the vacations, however the holiday-suicide fable persists (2024, December 6)
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