[quote='Minimalist' pid='158647' dateline='1311731591']
[quote]It wasn't all that long ago in historical terms that kids were married off at age 12-14.[/quote]
Indeed,and often dead by age 30, especially if female
.In England, the age of consent was 12 until the twentieth century. England was still hanging and transporting 12 year old miscreants well into the nineteenth century.
The concept of childhood we know today did not develop until Victorian times, by which time there was a large, prosperous middle class resulting frome the Industrial revolution.
Teenagers were invented in late 1950's and became a force as "baby boomers".
I guess adolescent angst had always existed but was ignored.I read that in our society, male teen suicide could in fact sometimes be over reported. It seems some apparent suicides are the result of auto erotic asphyxiation.It seems some parents would rather believe their child killed themselves rather than accept he was a sexual being.
I would argue that being a teenager would be only one factor in a decision too commit suicide(iE a corellation) and not necessarily THE deciding factor. It's worth noting that severely depressed people of any age tend to become irrational,unable to think clearly about realistic choices available.
The desire to die may not even be conscious in otherwise healthy people who kill themselves. Underlying is deep, overwhelming emotional pain. The desire is to end the anguish, not necessarily to die.
I am not aware of a teenage suicide epidemic in my country,nor indeed if there is an overall increase..In his seminal work 'SUIDE' (suicide) Emile Durkheim argued that suicide rates tends will rise at times of social unrest and insecurity. He coined the term "anomie" to describe such a societal state. The full article is worth reading (his book is pretty dry)
[quote]Suicide (French: Le Suicide) was one of the groundbreaking books in the field of sociology. Written by French sociologist Émile Durkheim and published in 1897 it was a case study of suicide, a publication unique for its time which provided an example of what the sociological monograph should look like.[/quote]
[quote]Findings
Durkheim explores the differing suicide rates among Protestants and Catholics, arguing that stronger social control among Catholics results in lower suicide rates. According to Durkheim, Catholic society has normal levels of integration while Protestant society has low levels. There are at least two problems with this interpretation. First, Durkheim took most of his data from earlier researchers, notably Adolph Wagner and Henry Morselli,[1] who were much more careful in generalizing from their own data. Second, later researchers found that the Protestant-Catholic differences in suicide seemed to be limited to German-speaking Europe and thus may always have been the spurious reflection of other factors.[2] Despite its limitations, Durkheim's work on suicide has influenced proponents of control theory, and is often mentioned as a classic sociological study.
Durkheim established that:
Suicide rates are higher in men than women (although married women who remained childless for a number of years ended up with a high suicide rate)
Suicide rates are higher for those who are single than those who are married
Suicide rates are higher for people without children than people with children
Suicide rates are higher among Protestants than Catholics and Jews
Suicide rates are higher among soldiers than civilians
Suicide rates are higher in times of peace than in times of war (the suicide rate in France fell after the coup d'etat of Louis Bonaparte, for example. War also reduced the suicide rate, after war broke out in 1866 between Austria and Italy, the suicide rate fell by 14% in both countries.)
Suicide rates are higher in Scandinavian countries
the higher the education level, the more likely it was that an individual would commit suicide, however Durkheim established that there is more correlation between an individual's religion and suicide rate than an individual's education level; Jewish people were generally highly educated but had a low suicide rate.[/quote]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_%28book%29
[quote]It wasn't all that long ago in historical terms that kids were married off at age 12-14.[/quote]
Indeed,and often dead by age 30, especially if female
.In England, the age of consent was 12 until the twentieth century. England was still hanging and transporting 12 year old miscreants well into the nineteenth century.
The concept of childhood we know today did not develop until Victorian times, by which time there was a large, prosperous middle class resulting frome the Industrial revolution.
Teenagers were invented in late 1950's and became a force as "baby boomers".
I guess adolescent angst had always existed but was ignored.I read that in our society, male teen suicide could in fact sometimes be over reported. It seems some apparent suicides are the result of auto erotic asphyxiation.It seems some parents would rather believe their child killed themselves rather than accept he was a sexual being.
I would argue that being a teenager would be only one factor in a decision too commit suicide(iE a corellation) and not necessarily THE deciding factor. It's worth noting that severely depressed people of any age tend to become irrational,unable to think clearly about realistic choices available.
The desire to die may not even be conscious in otherwise healthy people who kill themselves. Underlying is deep, overwhelming emotional pain. The desire is to end the anguish, not necessarily to die.
I am not aware of a teenage suicide epidemic in my country,nor indeed if there is an overall increase..In his seminal work 'SUIDE' (suicide) Emile Durkheim argued that suicide rates tends will rise at times of social unrest and insecurity. He coined the term "anomie" to describe such a societal state. The full article is worth reading (his book is pretty dry)
[quote]Suicide (French: Le Suicide) was one of the groundbreaking books in the field of sociology. Written by French sociologist Émile Durkheim and published in 1897 it was a case study of suicide, a publication unique for its time which provided an example of what the sociological monograph should look like.[/quote]
[quote]Findings
Durkheim explores the differing suicide rates among Protestants and Catholics, arguing that stronger social control among Catholics results in lower suicide rates. According to Durkheim, Catholic society has normal levels of integration while Protestant society has low levels. There are at least two problems with this interpretation. First, Durkheim took most of his data from earlier researchers, notably Adolph Wagner and Henry Morselli,[1] who were much more careful in generalizing from their own data. Second, later researchers found that the Protestant-Catholic differences in suicide seemed to be limited to German-speaking Europe and thus may always have been the spurious reflection of other factors.[2] Despite its limitations, Durkheim's work on suicide has influenced proponents of control theory, and is often mentioned as a classic sociological study.
Durkheim established that:
Suicide rates are higher in men than women (although married women who remained childless for a number of years ended up with a high suicide rate)
Suicide rates are higher for those who are single than those who are married
Suicide rates are higher for people without children than people with children
Suicide rates are higher among Protestants than Catholics and Jews
Suicide rates are higher among soldiers than civilians
Suicide rates are higher in times of peace than in times of war (the suicide rate in France fell after the coup d'etat of Louis Bonaparte, for example. War also reduced the suicide rate, after war broke out in 1866 between Austria and Italy, the suicide rate fell by 14% in both countries.)
Suicide rates are higher in Scandinavian countries
the higher the education level, the more likely it was that an individual would commit suicide, however Durkheim established that there is more correlation between an individual's religion and suicide rate than an individual's education level; Jewish people were generally highly educated but had a low suicide rate.[/quote]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_%28book%29
