Suicide and Society
Suicide: An Individual Phenomenon or a Societal Construct?
Statistics show that suicide rates in the U.S. are highly predictable. It is annually expected each year that over 30,000 suicides will occur, as compared to about 17,000 homicides. This stable and predictable estimate of suicide rate stems from a precise analysis of social factors describing four separate categories of suicidal influences: egoistic, altruistic, anomic, and fatalistic. According to the functionalist theory described by Emile Durkheim, rates are social facts based on other established social facts, and thus have a sociological basis. As suicide rates are social facts, Durkheim set out to provide an empirical basis of social explanation regarding suicide, providing a far different account of trends than the previously perceived notion that suicide is based purely on individual or psychological reasons. Thus, the phenomenon of what actually motivates the occurrence of suicide can be examined from a social perspective, implicating society as a factor in stimulating an individual to commit suicide.
Theoretical Perspective
As Henslin explains in Down to Earth Sociology, the study of sociology proposes several different events. He explains, societies structure and nuances are interrelated, society is dynamic and defined in history, and individuals can flourish in society through a system of selection. Thus, sociologists like Durkheim study the dynamics of society to account for historical and social justifications, finding relevance in social outcomes. In the case of suicide, Durkheim defines it as, "all cases of death resulting directly of indirectly from a positive or negative act of the victim himself, which he knows will produce this result," excluding accidental deaths from this scenario. Upon Durkheim's functionalist analysis of suicide rates, factoring in demographics, he accounted for distinct trends in the consistency of the rates, noting a series of social sets implying a collective tendency toward the results. He narrowed his theory on societal...
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