Press Inaccurately Suggests Suicides Rise During the Holidays

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Press Inaccurately Suggests Suicides Rise During the Holidays

by Daniel Romer, Patrick Jamieson, Nancy J. Holtschlag, Hermon Mebrathu, And Kathleen Hall Jamieson*

Annenberg's Study Finds that Print Press Inaccurately Suggests Suicides Rise During the Holidays

As Christmas approaches, TV stations begin re-airing Frank Capra?s "It's a Wonderful Life" in which a character played by Jimmy Stewart decides against suicide after recalling the good he has been able to do during his life. Although suicides do not peak at such holidays as Christmas, many news stories also begin to appear that make the connection.

Indeed, this is the perception created by two thirds of the stories we coded for the last end-of-year holiday period (from 11/8/1999 to 1/15/2000). Some examples of this mis-attribution included the following:

"Suicide attempts and domestic violence may increase during the holidays." --Ventura County Star, Ventura County, CA, (December 21, 1999).

"We do kind of dread this time of year, because the holiday season brings with it an increase in casualty reports, people being depressed and a rise in suicides," said Detective Sgt. Thomas Joyce." -- Portland Press Herald, Portland, ME, December 20, 1999.

"Holiday seasons are really traditionally hard times for lonely people," Mead notes. "The suicide rate goes up." -- The Tennessean, November 25, 1999.

"Everyone knows the suicide rate is higher in the weeks between Thanksgiving and just past New Years." "As it turns out, . . . the number of self inflicted deaths actually decreases between Thanksgiving and Christmas; they peak on New Years Eve and Day, according to various surveys." -- from a column by Mary McNamara, Los Angeles Times, December 1, 1999.

Not all of the misinformation is found in news or feature articles. A letter to the editor of The Times-Picayune (Jan 9, 2000) reports "Christmas is the time of year when depression, suicides and drunken driving fatalities are at their peek (sic)."

The Stories Assumed Some Predictable Forms

Although suicides occur throughout the year, the press has a tendency to imply or state that those that occur on a holiday are attributable to such factors as holiday blues whether there is a relationship to the holiday or not.

For example, a story in The Patriot Ledger of Quincy MA (January 6, 2000) detailed a suicide as follows: "Her plans to finally leave an abusive relationship ended New Year's Eve when her boyfriend aimed a shotgun at her chest, shot her twice and killed her. Garey J. Ricardo, 46, then killed himself, authorities say." But was the event related to New Year's Eve? Later in the story we discover that "Friends and relatives of Ricardos said he learned New Years Eve that Dickess was dating someone else and planned to move out."

Around holidays there is also a rise in stories that anticipate an increase in suicide attempts. "In San Francisco, suicide-prevention services added extra hot line staff in the event that New Year's hoopla triggered more bouts of depression (Jan 107 2000, Chicago Sun Times).

When the anticipated rise does not materialize however, papers often fail to cover that fact. As the millennium approached there was widespread anticipation of a rise in suicides. Hotlines increased their staffing. While many papers reported the anticipation, few followed up to report that the New Year had not produced the forecasted surge in suicide. The New York Times (Jan 11 2000) was an exception. "[J]ust as the year 2000 scare fizzled, the calls tapered off and CrisisLink and other mental health centers found the holiday uneventful."

When there are no suicides on a holiday, news accounts tend to express surprise. "Police throughout the Greater Toronto Area reported an unusually quiet New Year's Eve, with the exception of a few drunken street revellers, loud house parties and several would be suicides," reported The Toronto Sun (Jan 1, 2000)

Few Stories Gave an Accurate Picture of Suicide during the Holidays Our search found that only 13% of the 67 articles clearly attempted to debunk the association between suicide and the holidays.

In addition,

- 21% (14) reported a suicide as occurring near or on a holiday (e.g., "the Christmas suicide") but did not explicitly state that the holiday was a causal factor - 10% (7) also noted that suicides do not peak during the holidays but still focused the story on the possibility of an association.

Of the stories that explicitly connected suicides with the Christmas holidays in 1999-2000, only 18% (8) cited research suggesting an association.

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The most common explanations for the association in the 53 stories that identified a potential link were

- The "holiday blues" (55%) - Millenium madness (26%) - Disappointment at holiday time (21%) - Problems that come to a head at the holidays (19%) - Excessive drinking at the holidays (17%)

Only 25% (13) of the stories identified depression or other chronic mental-health conditions as the most common underlying cause of suicide. Only 18 (34%) gave accurate advice for the prevention of suicide, such as looking for signs of depression, encouraging depressed people to seek treatment, and not shying away from the discussion of suicide with family members who appear suicidal.

Stories that emphasized the link between suicide and the holidays tended to use less knowledgeable sources than stories that attempted to correct the misunderstanding.

-Among the 44 stories that made the association, only 27% relied on a source who could be considered knowledgeable about suicide epidemiology, such as officials at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), or researchers in the field. The nine stories that debunked the association used a knowledgeable source eight times (89%).

-Those who indicated a relationship between suicide and the holidays included police officers, hot-line managers, and a social worker.

Suicides Peak in the Spring and Fall

Suicide is a serious public health problem accounting for between .4 and .9% of the deaths in the U.S. The CDC also report that in the population at large it is the eighth leading cause of death; but among adolescents, the third leading cause. In l998, 30,551 Americans took their own lives.

In the most recent year for which detailed national data are available (1996), the chart below indicates that November and December rank the lowest in the number of daily suicides. Spring and Fall are by the far the riskiest seasons for suicides in the US. Although research indicates that suicides may increase for a brief period after New Years day, January still remains one of lowest months for suicide risk in the US.

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Source: National Center for Health Statistics

*Dan Romer is the Director of Research at the Institute for Adolescent Risk Communication, Annenberg Public Policy Center. Patrick Jamieson, Nancy Holtschlag and Hermon Mebrathu are researchers in the Center, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson is the director of the project and of the Annenberg Public Policy Center.

http://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/07_adolescent_risk/suicide/dec14%20suicide%20report.htm

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