Suicide prevention and psychology: A review and future challenges

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to clarify how psychological research contributes to suicide prevention. First, we introduced previous reviews dealing with this problem from two perspectives: the theory on prediction of suicide occurrence and validated suicide prevention methods. Although not fully dealt with in previous reviews, we next reviewed studies on suicide prevention education, utilization of internet-related technologies for suicide prevention, and the grief of suicide survivors. In addition, we discussed the issues of psychological research on suicide as a way of improving the prediction accuracy on the occurrence of suicide and generating alternatives for psychiatric discourse on suicide countermeasures. Finally, we discussed the question of whether promoting suicide prevention using psychological knowledge was synonymous with the contribution of psychology to our society based on a review of the research on the value of statistical life.