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Hannah Huffman
C. Douglas
Round Table Essay
25 April 2015
The Many Views of Media and Suicide Rates
There is no doubt that media has impacted suicide rates in a negative way over the
past decade. The question is, why? There are many different views and biases on this
topic that are very well supported with a lot of evidence. It is a known fact that suicide
rates have taken a drastic rise due to the increase in media because of the advances in
technology. There are three different ideas that keep appearing in all of the research that
has been gathered over the course of this semester. These concepts are cyberbullying,
media coverage, and last but not least, media contagion.
Cyberbullying can be defined as the use of electronic communication to bully a
person. This can happen by sending messages of a threatening nature to another
individual through the use of things like social media. Studies show that cyberbullying
has been directly linked to many suicide cases over the previous decade. Cyberbullying is
more prevalent in the younger demographic because most young adults have access to
cellphones and computers. With access to cellphones and computers, there is also easy
access to the Internet, which leads to access to any social media site. Social media sites
have become popular in every age group because it is a good way to reconnect with your
friends and stay in touch. This privilege is often abused when used by the younger
generation. Bullying is something that has always happened in school. Now people,
particularly younger adults, are not able to escape the bullies even when they are away

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from school due to the mass social network that most people use on a daily basis. Studies
also show that it is much easier to say something on the Internet without consequence
because a lot of parents do not monitor their childrens social media pages and there are
not teachers there to stop it like traditional bullying in school systems. In the scholarly
article, Social Media and Suicide: A Public Health Perspective, David Luxton, Jennifer
June, and Jonathan Fairall say that Although cyberbullying cannot be identified as a sole
predictor of suicide in adolescents and young adults, it can increase risk of suicide by
amplifying feelings of isolation, instability, and hopelessness for those with preexisting
emotional, psychological, or environmental stressors. Young children are already going
through the struggle of finding themselves, wanting to fit in, and having the coolest outfit
of the day. With cyberbullying added on top of the everyday stress that the average
middle school and high school child has, the outcome could be devastating. Many experts
agree that cyberbullying is the number one cause of the increase of suicide rates,
pertaining to media.
Experts also believe that media coverage has impacted the increase in suicide
rates over the past decade. Media coverage is when information is reported through the
use of any type of media. These different types could be on the local news channel on
your television, through social media, print media, and virtually anywhere on the Internet.
The problem with this is that anyone can hear about anything they wanted through media
coverage. They could even search or hear about ways to commit suicide. Because the
Internet is such a huge system with countless pages of any kind of information possible,
there are even negative websites that users can find. One of these types of websites is a
pro-suicide chat room. These chat rooms are self-explanatory and they simply promote

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suicide. The use of online chat rooms can provide a way for people to share their feelings
with other people who feel the same way because they find it easier talking to complete
strangers about their thoughts on suicide. There are also issues such as cyber-suicide
pacts. A cyber-suicide pact is when two or more people meet on the Internet and make an
agreement that they will commit suicide on the same day and at the same time. These
have become more prevalent with the increase in technology and having access to the
Internet at any time of the day. The main difference between a traditional suicide pact and
a cyber-suicide pact is that in a cyber-suicide pact, the individuals are most likely
complete strangers. In the scholarly article, Social Media and Suicide: A Public Health
Perspective, the authors give the statistic that The first documented use of the Internet to
form a suicide pact was reported in Japan in 2000. It has now become a more common
form of suicide in Japan, where the suicide rate increased from 34 suicides in 2003 to 91
suicides in 2005. Cyber-suicide pacts have been around a lot longer than most people
would have imagined. It is very clear that media coverage is a risk factor in suicide rates.
Media contagion has become another large issue when connected to death by
suicide. Media contagion is when an individual may see where a celebrity has died by an
overdose and then reenacts the death. This can also be referred to as a copycat death.
Copycat deaths have been around for a very long time beginning in 1774 when people
began reenacting the death of a character from a novel called The Sorrows of Young Man
Werther. This novel was written by Goethe and was banned because it was said to be
responsible for many suicides in Italy and Copenhagen. Another death that caused uproar
was that of Marilyn Monroe. She committed suicide in August of 1962 and during that
month, there were an additional 303 suicides that resembled her death. Now that

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everyone has the entire world in their hand at all times, they automatically hear about the
death of famous people as soon as it happens. Experts believe that this is another reason
for the increase in suicide rates because of how attached people get to celebrities. They
believe that copycat suicides are happening more often because of the availability of
information on the original deaths.
There is sufficient evidence to prove that cyberbullying, media coverage, and
media contagion have all impacted the suicide death rates. Although media may not be
the only thing that has helped increase suicide rates over the past decade, it is certainly
one of the main factors. After learning about all three of these topics, one must wonder
what can be done to turn this increase into a decrease.