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Abstract
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How shall we talk about suicide? The answer to this question is different for experts in the field (including researchers, clinicians and medical examiners) and lay people, but even lay people are influenced by the suggestions and decisions made by the experts.
Suicidologists have given much thought to the definition of suicidal behavior. The Centers for Disease Control convened a workgroup which published Operational Criteria for the Determination of Suicide (Rosenberg, Davidson, Smith, Berman, Buzbee, Gantner, et al., 1988). Completed suicide was defined as "death from injury, poisoning, or suffocation where there is evidence (either explicit or implicit) that the injury was self-inflicted and the decedent intended to kill himself/herself" (O'Carroll, Berman, Maris, Mosicki, Tanney, & Silverman, 1996, p. 244). The critical component of this definition is the requirement of an intent to die, for this requires judgment on the part of those classifying the cause of death. O'Carroll, et al. (1996) thought that the question was one of any level of intent versus no intent at all, rather than the level of intent,6 but others have argued that the actual level of intent is critical for a good nomenclature. More recently, several suicidologists have proposed new systems of nomenclature for suicidal behavior, hoping to bring consistency in the terminology (e.g., Marušič, 2004; Silverman, Berman, Sanddal, O'Carroll, & Joiner, 2007).
In addition to the debate over how "suicide" should be defined and suicidal behaviors classified, there is also conflict over what behaviors should be included under this term. For example, some view suicide bombers as suicides while others do not. Let us first look at whether experts can agree of which behaviors constitute suicide
Language: en |