Suicide: A Leading Cause of Mortality in the US - Research Paper

Introduction

For this assignment, suicide is chosen as an injury-related public health problem. Suicide is one of the leading causes of mortality in the United States. The term suicide refers to death attributed to self-injurious behavior. There are also two critical terms related to suicide- suicide attempt and suicidal ideation (Klonsky, May, & Saffer, 2016; Otsuka et al., 2015). A suicide attempt refers to a non-fatal self-injurious behavior with the intention of death but that may not lead to injury (Bilsen, 2018). On the one hand, suicidal ideation is the act of having thoughts about suicide or a plan (Korczak, 2015).

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Incidence Rates of Suicide in the USA and a Description of Populations at Risk

Suicide has been reported to be among the top ten leading causes of death in the USA. For example, in 2017, it was established that suicide was the tenth leading cause of death, with more than 47,000 individuals losing their lives (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019). It is also important to understand suicide trends over time. The rates of suicide in the USA is calculated based on the number of individuals who have lost their lives through suicide per 100,000 population (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019). The most recent suicide trends data shows that from 2001 to 2017, the suicide rates increased from 10.7% to 14.0%, representing a 31% jump in suicide rates (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019).

There are two populations at risk for suicide in the USA- males and people aged between 10 and 34 years (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019). It has been established that the suicide rate in the male population is four-fold higher than in the female population. The latest data (2017) shows that compared to suicide rates of 6.1/100,000 among females, suicide among the males was 22.4/100,000 (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019). Among individuals aged 10 and 34, suicide was the second leading cause of death, after unintentional injury (The National Institute of Mental Health, 2019).

Community-Level Factors Linked to Increased Risk for Injury

Various factors can increase the risk of suicide in a particular population. For instance, among young individuals below the age of 35 years, the disproportionately higher incidence of suicide has been linked to bullying (John et al., 2018). A recent study has also shown that cyberbullied youths below the age of 25 have more than a two-fold higher likelihood of self-injury and suicidal behavior than their non-cyberbullied counterparts (ScienceDaily, 2018). Similarly, perpetrators of cyberbullying were also found to be at elevated risk of having self-harm behavior and suicidal thoughts. In a related study, Peng et al. (2019) found out that both traditional and cyberbullying leads to increased suicide attempts, self-harm, and suicidal ideation. Childhood bullying victimization occurs in different community levels, both more common in schools (Andersen et al., 2015).

Suicide attempts among young people have also been attributed to exposure to individuals who have attempted or committed suicide, access to means of avenues of committing suicide, psychosocial stressors, certain personality attributes, and mental disorders (Bilsen, 2018). On the other hand, higher rates of suicide in men than women have been linked ease of access to drugs in the community, substance abuse, and drug addiction (Breet, Goldstone, & Bantjes, 2018).

Identification and Description of an Organization in Which Violence is Prevalent

Violence is highly prevalent in US schools. According to UNESCO (2016), violence in schools is a daily reality that negatively affects the rights of children and youth to acquire a meaningful education. Every year, 246 million school-going children and young individuals are exposed to violence (CDC, 2019). Victims of violence are more likely to be girls than boys and those that are perceived not to adhere to accepted gender and sexual norms. Examples of violent behaviors in school include gang violence, cyberbullying, use of a weapon, and fighting. School violence can occur in many places- on school compounds, when students are going back to their homes, in school-related events (CDC, 2019).It is also vital to understand the school-level factors associated with violence. It has been established that physical violence is more likely to be witnessed in schools with a disproportionately higher number of girls than boys (Knight et al., 2016). School environments perceived by students as unsafe have also been reported to be prone to violence (Atalay et al., 2018).

The Role of Change Agents in School Violence

In this assignment, the Stage Theory of Organizational Change will be used to explore the role of change agents in reducing violence. In the first stage, individuals are aware of the existence of the problem and possible solutions. The second stage is characterized by people's adoption of an innovation aimed at solving the problem. In the third stage, members of an organization implement an innovation via modification of the organizational structures for accommodation of the new behavior. The fourth stage of is where institutionalization of innovation takes place.

In a school, a change agent can be the administrators (principal and deputy principal) and the teachers. Using the first stage of the Stage Theory, the administrators create awareness of the existence of violence in the school and suggest possible solutions to the students. After that, the teachers and the students adopt solutions to school violence such as school violence prevention and response plan, helping students to adopt good behavior, and encouraging participation in extra-curricular activities. Lastly, modification of organizational structures for accommodation of the new solutions can include setting up of disciplinary committee and guidance and counselling teams to help in the implementation of the solutions.

References

Andersen, L. P., Labriola, M., Andersen, J. H., Lund, T., & Hansen, C. D. (2015). Bullied at school, bullied at work: A prospective study. BMC Psychology, 3(1), 35. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-015-0092-1

Atalay, B. I., Unal, E., Onsuz, M. F., Isikli, B., Yenilmez, C., & Metintas, S. (2018). Violence and related factors among high school students in semirural areas of Eskisehir. Northern Clinics of Istanbul, 5(2), 125-131. https://doi.org/10.14744/nci.2017.91259

Bilsen, J. (2018). Suicide and youth: Risk factors. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 9. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2018.00540

Breet, E., Goldstone, D., & Bantjes, J. (2018). Substance use and suicidal ideation and behaviour in low- and middle-income countries: A systematic review. BMC Public Health, 18. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5425-6

CDC. (2019). Preventing school violence. https://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/youthviolence/schoolviolence/fastfact.html

John, A., Glendenning, A. C., Marchant, A., Montgomery, P., Stewart, A., Wood, S., Lloyd, K., & Hawton, K. (2018). Self-harm, suicidal behaviours, and cyberbullying in children and young people: Systematic review. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 20(4), e129. https://doi.org/10.2196/jmir.9044

Klonsky, E. D., May, A. M., & Saffer, B. Y. (2016). Suicide, suicide attempts, and suicidal ideation. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 12, 307-330. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-clinpsy-021815-093204

Knight, L., Nakuti, J., Allen, E., Gannett, K. R., Naker, D., & Devries, K. M. (2016). Are school-level factors associated with primary school students' experience of physical violence from school staff in Uganda? International Health, 8(1), 27-35. https://doi.org/10.1093/inthealth/ihv069

Korczak, D. J. (2015). Suicidal ideation and behaviour. Paediatrics & Child Health, 20(5), 257-260. Retrieved from https://academic.oup.com/pch/article-abstract/20/5/257/2648915

Otsuka, K., Nakamura, H., Kudo, K., Endo, J., Sanjo, K., Fukumoto, K., Hoshi, K., Yagi, J., & Sakai, A. (2015). The characteristics of the suicide attempter according to the onset time of the suicidal ideation. Annals of General Psychiatry, 14(1), 48. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12991-015-0087-6

Peng, Z., Klomek, A. B., Li, L., Su, X., Sillanmaki, L., Chudal, R., & Sourander, A. (2019). Associations between Chinese adolescents subjected to traditional and cyber bullying and suicidal ideation, self-harm and suicide attempts. BMC Psychiatry, 19(1), 324. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-019-2319-9

ScienceDaily. (2018). Young victims of cyberbullying twice as likely to attempt suicide and self-harm, study finds. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/04/180419130923.htm

The National Institute of Mental Health. (2019). Suicide. https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide.shtml

UNESCO. (2016). School violence and bullying. Retrieved from https://en.unesco.org/themes/school-violence-and-bullying