 | This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. |
 | This page in a nutshell: Be careful how you write about suicide, particularly in articles about serious medical conditions or people who have killed themselves. |
Not everyone who reads our encyclopaedia is in a normal state of mind. Editors are asked to consider the risk of what the authors of this essay are calling suicide-normalizing language.
Suicidal behaviour is neither a normal response to the levels of stress experienced by most people, nor a standard consequence of major mental disorders.[1]
Wikipedia is in the real world, and Wikipedia articles can cause real harm. Suicide is communicable. According to the WHO, word choice in articles about people who kill themselves can protect against this suicide contagion.[2]
"Suicide-normalizing language" is when a Wikipedia article implies that suicide is a normal response to an event or diagnosis. Scientists know that suicide is not a normal response to an abnormal situation; it is instead an abnormal reaction to a normal situation.[3]
For example, consider the phrase:
Condition X is painful and difficult to treat, and sufferers are much more likely than the general population to kill themselves.
These words may be true and well-sourced. There are diseases such as Trigeminal neuralgia, historically called suicide disease. Nevertheless, the order of ideas implies that suicide is an appropriate or normal response to the diagnosis. Wikipedia could be a factor in a person's decision to attempt suicide.
- ^ Rihmer, Zoltán; Rutz, Wolfgang (2021). "Early detection and management of suicidal patients in primary care". In Wasserman, Danuta (ed.). Oxford Textbook of Suicidology and Suicide Prevention (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 437. doi:10.1093/med/9780198834441.003.0052. ISBN 9780198834441.
- ^ https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/258814/WHO-MSD-MER-17.5-eng.pdf
- ^ van Heeringen, Kees (2018). "Introduction". The Neuroscience of Suicidal Behavior. Cambridge Fundamentals of Neuroscience in Psychology. Cambridge University Press. pp. xii–xiii. ISBN 9781107148949.