Teens' View on Suicide

Curious about what teens perceive as grounds for suicide, a scientist has traveled to Australia, Italy and India to find the answer. She was also curios about the values and social significance that teenagers gave to this action, as well as about the attitudes associated with it. The investigator interviewed more than 700 people, aged 18 through 24, in order to get to the bottom of this, and she managed to identify both the similarities and differences in views that united and differentiated the youngsters, PhysOrg reports.

“First, there were differences in prevalence with more Italian and Australian youths indicating they think about suicide, compared to Indians. In contrast, Indians reported more suicide attempts, followed by Australians and then Italians,” Dr. Erminia Colucci, PhD, an expert at the University of Queensland, in Australia, says. The differences appeared in terms of the reasons many of the respondents thought of or attempted suicide for. Financial problems took the top spot in the case of the Indian youth, whereas Australians were more likely to take this step on account of depression, anxiety, or other forms of mental illnesses.

On the other hand, Italians on average said that loneliness and problems with other people were the main drivers behind suicide as how they perceived it. “Australia generally sees suicide as a result of depression or some other mental health issues, but I don't believe that mental illness is all there is to it – what at the end leads to suicide may be depression, but the depression might come out of another issue. My interest is for those 'other' issues that have generated the feelings that life is not worth living and suicide is the only way out. It's also about what makes life worth living, what makes people hold on in difficult times, and spirituality above all,” the expert adds.

Her work has started receiving widespread attention, both in Australia and abroad, as policymakers, social workers and parents begin to wake up to the reality of the fact that specific socio-cultural settings may play a role that is just as significant as each individual's own motives and issues. “My approach is about listening, to understand suicide from their point of view by using art for research and for advocacy and prevention,” Colucci says. Currently, she is setting up an art exhibition that will show the Australian people how artists understand and deal with suicide.