SOCA01H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 1: Youth Suicide, Solidarity, Social Forces
Document Summary
At the end of 19th century, emile durkheim demonstrated that social forces strongly influence suicide rates not just an individual act of desperation resulting from a psychological disorder. Examined the association between rates of suicide and rates of psychological disorder for different groups (i. e. if suicide rates tend to be high where psychological disorders are high) The more social solidarity a group exhibits, the more firmly anchored individuals are to the social world and less likely they are to take their own life if adversity strikes. Expected high-solidarity groups to have lower suicide rates than low-solidarity groups did, up to a point suicide rate declines and then rises as social solidarity rises. Suicide in high solidarity settings = altruistic = ex: soldiers. Younger/middle-aged adults (not likely to live alone, have a spouse/partner, have a job/network of friends) than the elderly. Men are almost four times as likely as women to commit suicide.
