Community attitudes toward childhood suicide and attempted suicide

To assess whether people's reactions to family members of child suicide attemptors were similar to reactions to family members of (a) actual suicides and (b) actual suicides that were preceded by a failed suicide attempt, 120 shoppers (60 men and 60 women) read and responded to one of five short newspaper articles about an incident of a 10-year-old child who either (a) attempted suicide, (b) committed suicide, (c) committed suicide after a previous suicide attempt, (d) died accidentally, or (e) died of a viral illness. Opinions about the psychological health of the victim and reactions to the surviving family varied depending on the nature of the incident. However, in many instances reactions to families of suicide attemptors could not be differentiated from reactions to families of actual suicides. Therefore, it is likely that the number of people affected by negative community reactions to suicidal behavior has been previously underestimated.