Teenage Suicide

Teenage Suicide

The killing of own life intentionally is referred as suicide. Over the past years, American society has been concerned about this issue, especially teenage suicide. The suicide rate among teenagers is not constant for a period of time; it keeps changing over time. Most of the time, the suicide rate among boys is greater than that among girls.

Different types of people in our society respond to this issue in different ways. Earlier in this year, some 932 parents of adolescents completed a questionnaire of 30 common psychological medical concerns of adolescence, among which suicide was one item. They were asked how important it is for pediatricians to discuss these with their kids during checkups. The result showed that more than 66% of the parents being questioned said 29 of the 30 items were important to be discussed with their teenage children. This survey showed that American parents are somehow concerned about suicide among teenagers.

This concern is pervasive among American teenagers. In 1993, a national survey of adolescents about their knowledge of, and attitudes toward, youth suicide was made. The survey reulted that 60% of the teenagers reported knowing another teen who had attempted suicide while 6% reported having make an attempt themselves. The above two examples indicates that it is very important for parents, counselors, or different institutions to become aware of the reasons and symptons of teenage suicide and to find out possible preventive procedures.

Recently, an examination of suicide rates among Black and White adolescents from

1986 to 1991 was made. It showed that suicide rate among girls of all ethnicities remained stable. Also, the rate for White boys were pretty much stabilized; however, the rate for Black and other minority boys increased significantly. Those increases were more rapid in areas where suicide rates were historically low. This phenomenon tells that there are various kinds of reasons for suicide and different types of methods for suicide are also being used. During the late 1970s and early 1980s in Oxford, the rate of deliberate self-poisoning and self-injury in older female teenagers declined, but it increased again between 1986 and 1989. For male adolescents, self-poisoning with minor tanquillizers and sedatives had declined, but paracetamol self- poisoning increased in that period. In Zimbabwe, young women during 1970s used poison as the method of suicide; however, self-immolation was frequently being used in the mid 1980s.

There are various types of reasons why teenagers commit suicide. Suicide in teenagers is sometimes linked to, or in relation with, vision therapy. It was argued that an inadequate level of concentration or short attention span of a patient is a common cause for the academic, personality, and behavioral