Suicide And The World War II

“Suicide is applied to all cases of death resulting directly or indirectly from a positive or negative act of the victim himself, which he knows will produce this result” (Durkheim 34). Suicide is a phenomenon that has plagued our world since the beginning of time. It currently accounts for the second leading cause of death in people ages ten to twenty-four years old (Garni Powerpoint). This means of ending your own life is something we can prevent as a society. If we can eliminate societal pressures and stereotypes we can all be treated equally. All suicides during a certain time period are grouped together, when in all reality we should be treating each situation as it’s own. Durkheim states “...with it’s own unity, individuality, and consequently its own nature- a nature, furthermore, dominantly social”.

The first sociologist to theorize on suicide and its sociological interpretations was Emile Durkheim. Durkheim worked during the late 1800’s identifying social structures as the key determinant in self-destructive behaviour. In his work Suicide: A study in Sociology, Durkheim stated that “suicide rates increase when a society’s value system breaks down.”2 Durkheim believed that the shared values of a society and the mechanisms in place that ensure that its members adhere to these values, is interpreted as a person’s “social structure.” Durkheim suggested two basic factors in social structure that heavily influence the incidence of suicide. These are regulation and integration. He believed that an individual needs to become part of, and find direction in his own society. Without these factors in place, suicide becomes a common substitute. Teens are often anxious about fitting in to their society (especially among peer groups) so it is clear that integration is essential to adolescence. Durkheim also suggested that it is these two factors

Durkheim’s theories and work on suicide classified the phenomenon into four types; Egoistic, Altruistic, Anomic and Fatalistic (Ritzer Pg 200-202). Durkheim’s concept of social integration ties into egoistic suicide as it

Researchers wanted to study suicide methods in South Korea. The research took place from 2011 to 2015 elementary children. During the 5-year study, there were 19 elementary students who committed suicide. From a female to male ratio it was recorded as 7:12. Research shows the different methods of suicide ranged from, jumping, hanging, intoxication, and an unknown. Jumping or falling from high heights was noted as the most frequent method of suicide. 12 out of 19 students committed suicide by jumping from heights; 5 out of 19 students committed suicide by hanging. The last 2 reported suicides were committed by intoxication and unknown. Studies also showed that more in metropolitan areas there was a suicide rate of 57.9%. The article was intended for psychologists. The article is helpful because the research mentions that most frequent suicides were committed at home, and suggesting factors of stress lead to

Suicide has historically been and continues to be a significant issue in the United States, for civilians as well as active duty military service members and veterans. While statistics surrounding suicide appear to be just numbers on a page, I personally implore the reader of the following paper to never lose sight of the fact that those numbers represent real people. Each one of those people, be they civilian or military, represent a loss of a father or a mother, a brother or a sister, a son or a daughter, a best friend, a comrade, …a person whose life, and that life’s potential, is now forever lost. The following statistics on suicide rates in the United States do not differentiate if the individual was a civilian, an active duty

According to the American Psychological Association, and based on the national suicide rates in 2007, suicide was the 8th leading cause of death for Asian-Americans, and the 11th leading cause of death for all racial and ethnic groups combined. The second leading cause of death for Asian-Americans between the ages 15-34 was suicide. Among all Asian-Americans, 20-24 year olds had the highest suicide rates of all (Heron, M. 2011). Above all, Asian women have a higher suicide rate than males (Xu, J.2010). A significant amount of research and many studies of suicide among Asian Americans reveal many factors that play a role in these high numbers.

Suicide is defined as “The action of killing oneself intentionally” within both South Korea and Wales. Suicide is seen as a huge social issue in both Wales and South Korea, both countries have seen a huge rise in suicide rates in the last decade but South Korea disproportionately sees a higher rate of suicide. Both countries are experiencing a rise in suicide rates and so, suicide is seen as a huge social issue, with government and non governmental bodies aiming to combat it. In my investigation I will not only be researching who this issue affects and what issues seem to be the main cause for the growth in suicide rates, but also responses and ways people have tried to tackle this problem. To do this I will have to follow my aims, which

The topic of suicide can easily become uncomfortable when discussing. Thoughts of family or friends using a permanent solution to a temporary problem is hard to grasp. Why would an individual choose to do this? Did it stem from personal reasons or was it fueled by a number of out-siding factors. Using Sociology we can decipher human behavior and gain an insight into a global issue .

In The Politics of Suicide, Maria Teresa Brancaccio, Eric J. Engstrom, and David Lederer investigate and unravel the conceptualization and operationalization of suicide in the years leading up the Emile Durkheim. It wasn’t until the age of the Enlightenment that the concept of taking one’s own life was deemed worthy of scientific analysis (Brancaccio, Engstrom, & Lederer, 2013). It was during this time that police, physicians, and mental health care providers began to determine the indicators of such potential behaviors and began to see such rising trends as modern social dilemma (2013).

Durkheim does not see egoism, altruism, anomie and fatalism as types of suicide, but types of social structure that highlight the presence or lack of integration and regulation. It must be stressed that this excess/lack of integration and regulation are not seen as direct causes of suicide, rather Durkheim sees a number of voluntary deaths in society as inevitable; integration and regulation are merely prophylactic to suicidal impulses, which when taken to excess or dramatically reduced, fail to act as a preventative, and so suicides occur. This clarification is an important strength of Durkheim’s theory: it allows the biography of the individuals who kill themselves to vary, while still explaining underlying pressures/lack of to explain their deaths, and the varying suicide rates between groups.

Furthermore, social scientists have not been too involved in the topic of suicide. Since 1990-2009 there have not been many article on the topic and the disinterest can derive from the presumption that suicide is a lonesome act. The article “Suicide and the Creative Class,” states that, “Durkheim ([1897] 2006) illustrated that suicide is a social phenomenon by stating that levels of integration and

Traditionally, suicide was thought to be a purely individual decision but French sociologist Emile Durkheim recognized that the phenomenon had a social dimension. He believed in the influence of society on the individual and that if anything can explain that relation, it is suicide. His use of the data of suicide, not specific cases and reports, to study the societal trends reveals his true subject of study: society as a whole and its role in the individual experience. Durkheim uses the study of suicide via the quantitative methodological approach as a tool to study society as a broader whole.

Durkheim had spent many years working on his theory of suicide. Durkheim felt that when individuals do not know what they are expected to do, they were at a higher risk to commit suicide. He also felt that if individuals had too much freedom or not enough freedom they were also at a higher risk of suicide as well. Sociologists from around the world saw that there were many flaws in Durkheim’s theory of suicide. What Durkheim did not mention in his original theory of suicide that other sociologists found and pointed these findings out, so that others would be aware of it. From taking a different approach to Durkheim’s theory of suicide, this paper will show the differences in conflicts with his theory, while adding more to Durkheim’s theory of suicide from the views of different sociologists’ perspectives.

Loneliness, health defects, struggling economically, the death of a loved one, or a failed reasons, are many reasons to feel distraught and emotional, but some people take it as reasons one might potentially think of committing suicide. Suicide is everywhere. Although many people see a person committing suicide as a personal act, someone else thought differently. Emile Durkheim was considered one of the “Founding Thinkers of Society.” Durkheim was extremely interested in the finding out what holds society together, he focused on the shared experiences, perspectives, values, beliefs, and behaviors that allow people to feel that they are a part of a group that is capable of working together to maintain the group and their common interests. Durkheim wrote a book titled “Suicide,” in which he concluded that there are four different types of suicides. One of these different types of suicides was known as ‘Anomie Suicide,’ which can be described as normlessness, not having a set of norms so people fail to understand what's expected of them.This concept refers to how societal change, or the perception one has of it, can cause one to feel disconnected from society due to the changes in norms, values, and expectations. Thus, causing one to go in a state of physical and emotional depression.

Michael Phillipson observes the positivist methodology employed by Durkheim and other researches ‘ride roughshod over the very social reality they are trying to comprehend.’ He argues that suicide is a construct of social actors, an aspect of social reality. Official statistics on suicide are therefore not wrong or inaccurate; they are part of the social world. They are interpretations made by official of what is seen to be unnatural death.