When Gratitude Gets in the Way

/ kgordonlab / 2 Comments

While research on the effectiveness of gratitude interventions appears mixed, there’s a shared wisdom that being thankful for what you have is good for you. Most of us have had experiences where something stressful happens (e.g., a minor car accident, an argument with a friend), and we gain perspective by stepping back and appreciating the positive aspects of our lives.

But I’ve also observed instances when gratitude gets in the way. I’ve had friends and therapy patients start to talk about something that bothers them and then they cut themselves off and say, “But I know other people have it worse, so I shouldn’t complain.” I get the impulse–I do it too. I think it serves the purpose of displaying self-awareness or maybe mitigates fears that you’ll be judged as having petty concerns or maybe you think telling yourself that will make the feelings go away. To be sure, there are times when people could use a more zoomed-out perspective and appreciation for their lives. However, I’ve observed this approach hindering progress and worsening well-being too.

The pattern is usually that a person experiences distress, they try talking themselves out of it being a big deal, and then they end up avoiding actions that would actually help them feel better and improve the situation (e.g., leaning on a friend for support, doing something healthy like exercising, gaining clarity about painful emotions, problem-solving, going to therapy). If you’ve tried to address a situation by telling yourself that you should be more grateful and the feelings persist, it’s time to try something else. It doesn’t mean that you’re an ungrateful person for recognizing that you’re bothered by something despite all the people who have worse lives (and by the way, many of the people I’ve heard say this have had objectively terrible things happen to them!). It just means that you’re human and affected by the events surrounding you. Acknowledging your experiences and directly addressing them is a healthy way to deal with them and not an act of self-indulgence.*

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*I think it’s really hard to make any general statements when people can be all over the spectrum of gratitude and stress responses and vary from situation to situation, but thought I’d write this out for people who happen to fit into this kind of scenario.

 

 

Science Can Meaningfully Advance Public Discussion About Suicide

/ kgordonlab / 2 Comments

hope

Public discussion about suicide is dominated by particular types of narratives. Media outlets tend to focus on celebrities who, despite outward signs of success, are tragically driven to despair. Other news stories tell heartbreaking tales of young people who end their lives after experiencing readily identifiable stressors. This coverage is important, and compassionate media depiction is crucial for public understanding. However, discourse that’s constrained to certain kinds of stories obscures two key points: 1) suicide is really complicated and 2) it can affect anyone. With a trend of rising suicide rates in the United States, we need to expand our conversations and make more room for nuance.

Five years ago, I heard a story about a suicide attempt that broke the typical media mold. It was this powerful NPR Story Corps segment about a man named Kevin Berthia, who was extremely close to jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. In under three minutes, listeners learn that Berthia suffered from depression throughout his life and that this escalated to suicidal thinking when he couldn’t pay for his infant daughter’s enormous medical bills. This triggered embarrassment, self-directed anger, and feelings of failure. Filled with urgency to escape his overwhelming pain, he got directions to the bridge and climbed over the railing. He was stopped by an empathetic police officer, Kevin Briggs, who spoke with him for an hour and a half on the ledge before he decided to climb back to safety. Berthia’s life was saved, but his struggles continued for years. In a piece for the Guardian, he wrote, “Reporters are always after the happily-ever-after ending.” This coverage stands out because it includes his backstory and the moment-to-moment details of Berthia’s path toward, and ultimately away, from suicide.

Suicide is the result of a culmination of factors pushing people into excruciating states where death is viewed as relief. Suicidologists acknowledge that diverse pathways lead to suicidal desire and seek to identify commonalities among people in acutely risky states. For example, Berthia had pre-existing vulnerabilities related to growing up with some family conflict and in a neighborhood where he was pressured to hide his depression. Then, compounding the uniquely jarring worry of having a child in compromised health, Berthia also blamed himself for not being able to foot medical bills to the tune of a quarter of a million dollars. This propelled him to the Golden Gate Bridge with the thought, “All I gotta do is lean back and everything is done. I’m free of all this pain.”

Between StoryCorps and the Guardian article, we get a sense of several contributing factors and potential intervention points that are generalizable beyond Berthia’s individual situation. For example, there seems to be a sustained cultural push against the belief that people should hide depression. And while the Affordable Care Act sought to partially address the dire state of affairs for many Americans facing medical costs, additional changes are desperately needed to overhaul a system that leaves people struggling to meet basic physical needs. A comprehensive suicide prevention initiative would address these and other empirically-linked risk factors (e.g., incarceration, homelessness, combat exposure, physical illness, mental illness, and discrimination). This long list of suicide risk factors can leave people feeling overwhelmed and unsure of how to help. Thankfully, Klonsky and May (2015) developed a scientific framework called the Three-Step Theory (3ST) that meaningfully organizes and prioritizes this information:

3ST diagram

from Klonsky, May, & Saffer, 2016

Berthia’s experience appears to fit within the 3ST. The first step proposes that people desire suicide in the presence of pain and hopelessness about the future, “If someone’s day-to-day experience of living is characterized by pain, this individual is essentially being punished for living, which may decrease the desire to live and, in turn, initiate thoughts about suicide” (pp. 116-117). Within the 3ST, suicidal desire could be reduced by targeting both distal factors (e.g., eliminating environmental factors that increase the probability of emotional pain) and proximal factors (e.g., increasing hope and coping skills). People advance to the second step of increased suicidal intensity if their pain overpowers meaningful connections to life. In the moment Berthia was about to jump to his death, Briggs emphasized Berthia’s connection to his daughter and the suicidal intensity decreased, “My daughter, her first birthday was the next month. And you made me see that if nothing else, I need to live for her.” A society seeking to prevent suicide would foster these kinds of connections, at multiple levels, for as many people as possible. The 3ST makes the case, building on the interpersonal theory of suicide, that the survival instinct prevents most people from attempting suicide even if they desire it. The third step usefully identifies three facets of a capacity to override this survival instinct: dispositional (e.g., genetics related to pain sensitivity), acquired (e.g., experiences that result in decreased pain sensitivity and lowered fear of death), and practical (described as knowledge of and access to lethal means – e.g., in Berthia’s case, getting the directions to the bridge and not facing a suicide barrier once there). The practical aspect of capability for suicide has been the focus of initiatives to reduce access to lethal means in times of suicidal crises (e.g., through safe gun storage). Increasing safety at times of suicidal crisis can have long-lasting positive effects, as most suicide attempt survivors do not go on to die by suicide.

Suicide is complicated and that contributes to widespread misunderstanding. Science can guide us away from investing resources in domains that have unknown relationships with suicide and toward those that have demonstrably stronger ones. Research illuminates potent risk factors and makes our understanding of suicide more precise. Suicide prevention advocates have increased public awareness about a variety of different suicidal experiences and continue to fight for public policy aimed toward saving lives. Recently, there have been excellent examples of compassionate, realistic media coverage and fictional depictions of suicidal behavior. Altogether, this suggests that the public has the will to prioritize suicide as a public health problem. Scientific frameworks like the 3ST can steer us in productive, solution-focused directions.

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Suicide prevention information resources are available here, and here’s a summary of intervention research.

You can hear more of Kevin Berthia’s story here:

You can hear Kevin Briggs speak about Berthia’s story here.

 

The Cost of Giving the Benefit of the Doubt (or the Downside of an Elastic Heart)

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warning: lots of speculation in this post and only a little science

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Something that preoccupies me these days is the puzzle of sharing psychological science in accessible, interesting ways without undermining its complexity. This is isn’t a new problem – many brilliant people have been working on it for a long time. There’s been substantial progress, even when it’s hard to compete with the attention paid to public-facing psychologists who sacrifice accuracy for various incentives (see Ali Mattu for an excellent example of someone not sacrificing accuracy for engagement). Still, there’s a core challenge that keeps running through my mind that’s not fixable through improving technology or reducing jargon or changing incentives. It’s that there’s rarely (ever?) a one-size-fits-all (or even-a-vast-majority-fits-all) situation in psychology due to variability between situations and people (which Sanjay Srivastava wonderfully captured when he deemed psychology the hardest science).

One way that people get therapeutic-like info out to the public is through the kernels-of-wisdom model (e.g., a tweet, a meme, or Instagram photo with a message like, remember that you’re trying as hard as you can and that’s good enough). This model is appealing because it’s low cost and could be just enough to brighten up someone’s day or spread some insight (by the way, check out Anna Ropp‘s awesome, scientifically-informed Psych Tidbits Instagram account). No one’s under the illusion that it would replace therapy or other bigger life factors related to one’s mental health, and it’s unlikely to harm anyone.

Then, there are more concerted efforts at advice-giving through videos, books, and social media with varying levels of credibility and scientific support. To oversimplify things, the advice is usually get yourself together or stop being so hard on yourself. So, herein lies my concern: I think people are bad at guessing which message applies to them. And while I don’t think a little-bit-of-wisdom type message here and there causes problems, I think there could be a negative cumulative effect of repeated messaging out in the world that people should take one of these two approaches to improve their lives. For example, I’ve seen people who could use the message about not being too hard on themselves absorb the one about getting themselves together and consequently pushing themselves even more to the brink. Meanwhile, there are people who could improve their lives by pushing themselves in certain ways but avoid that by telling themselves they’re just engaging in self-care. And I’m sure I’ve done both at times; it’s human nature to find justifications for the thing we already want to do.

I’m slowly funneling to a specific example, which is this: advice that is often given, including by psychologists, is to give people the benefit of the doubt. This appeals to me in a number of ways consistent with my values – it seems like a nicer, more hopeful, and less angry way to be. It’s consistent with the scientific framework of waiting to interpret something based on evidence instead of intuition. And it’s good advice if you’re the type of person who would otherwise lean toward hostile attributions. On the other hand, consistently giving people the benefit of the doubt has costs that I rarely see acknowledged:

-It means questioning yourself a lot more when you sense that someone intends harm, which can erode your ability to trust your own perceptions.

-Without a belief that you can accurately assess and interpret situations, you can get stuck in a state of inaction rather than moving to resolve an issue.

-It can mean ignoring ambiguous, but existent warning signs that would have removed you from a dysfunctional situation earlier.

-If you’re prone to self-doubt, it may lead you to feel foolish for assuming good will in the first place. This is taxing and can affect productivity even once you’re in a better subsequent situation.

-People often trust cynics more than recurrent benefit-of-doubt-givers, as though they’re closer to truth when they assert their opinions. Cynicism is more likely to (erroneously) signal critical or deep thinking than benefit-of-doubt giving, which is typically linked to being naive or a pushover.

-A nontrivial number of people won’t reciprocate. It’s a good thing to assume the best in people in and of itself sometimes, but it’s also useful to strategically employ it with the hope of improving communication. Unfortunately, there are people who will take advantage of your approach while not extending any charitable interpretations to your behavior.

Despite every single cost I mentioned, I’d still argue that benefit-of-the-doubt giving is worthwhile and generally good advice to follow (perhaps because it’s aligned with my values or simply to justify my own past and future behavior). But, I’ve been reflecting on the costs more recently and thought writing them out might lead to hearing other people’s perspectives — so, I’m eager to hear what others think about the specific example or the broader issue of communicating universal psychology messages (but only if you mean well).*

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*I’ll assume you do.

Can Offensive Political Speech on Campus Cause Trauma?

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I went on Half Hour of Heterodoxy to talk about student reactions to political extremists giving speeches on college campuses. I was grateful for Chris Martin‘s interesting questions and wanted to expand on a few of the discussion points.

What’s the definition of trauma?

The DSM-5 defines trauma as exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence in one (or more) of the following ways: 1) directly experiencing the traumatic event(s), 2) witnessing, in person, the event(s) or the event(s) as it occurred to others, 3) learning that the traumatic event(s) occurred to a close family member or close friend, 4) work-related repeated or extreme exposure to aversive details of traumatic event(s).

Do political extremists cause trauma when they speak on campus?

DSM-defined trauma is unlikely to occur at these events unless there’s actual or threatened violence involved (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4). It’s important to avoid watering down the term trauma through misuse in situations where it doesn’t apply. However, I don’t think fear of acute trauma typically drives the opposition to political extremists on campus. I think the fear is more commonly about political extremists using campus appearances to spread discriminatory beliefs that perpetuate social inequities. The sense of threat comes from historical knowledge about the uses of propaganda, and it’s amplified when violent acts are carried out that reference this propaganda (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4). Some political extremists explicitly state that they’re trying to recruit college students to their causes (1, 2) and have developed strategies for persuading people through coded language (e.g., 1, 2, 3). Despite trauma being an unlikely consequence of these speeches, there is a robust literature showing that experiences of discrimination are related to worse mental and physical health (e.g., 1, 2, 3)* and that people can have physiological stress responses when exposed to discrimination and racism.** For example, it’s been proposed that these types of stress responses contribute to birth outcome disparities between Black and White women in the United States (e.g., 1, 2). 

What should universities do?

1) Actions should be individually-tailored for the particular university and involve discussion with students and faculty, instead of something pushed top-down from administrators. Include mental health experts in these conversations.

2) Express support for faculty and students. Even if you disagree with their viewpoints, don’t ridicule students or erroneously reduce all of their concerns to an inability to handle differences of opinion. Students are exposed to politically extreme views in spaces outside of campus speeches, and that exposure often shapes their beliefs about the particular speaker and the potential for harmful societal consequences. It’s not helpful to deride students who respond by using their time and resources to organize nonviolent protests to combat social inequality.

3) Don’t equate mental health issues with weakness or confuse therapy with avoidance. Normalize discussions about mental health on campus. University-wide e-mails are sent around about flu shots and other medical issues – it can be helpful to do the same with mental health information and resources. When people seek counseling, the first step involves determining whether the person has a mental health problem. If a student refers to something as trauma when it’s not, therapists provide them with that valuable corrective feedback. There’s also a misconception that therapy is about unconditional reassurance or hand-holding, but it’s actually all about empowering people to face their problems skillfully.

4) Be precise in stating your rationale for hosting speakers on campus. I doubt that many university administrators think there is educational value in speeches by people like Richard Spencer. Usually, they’re motivated by the importance of upholding free speech principles and are legally obliged to host speakers in public spaces. I’ve heard some arguments that there are educational and mental health benefits to having political extremists on campus (e.g., via exposure to “new and challenging” ideas). The free speech argument is compelling, but the educational and psychological growth arguments are not. I’m not aware of any evidence that exposure to inaccurate, dehumanizing ideas about groups of people confers psychological benefits (if you are aware of such research, please share it with me). For example, some students have opposed Ben Shapiro speaking on their campuses. As I have written about, he spreads false information about suicide and trans people (also watch Natalie Wynn refute Shapiro’s claims). It’s hard to comprehend how learning inaccurate ideas, which are used to restrict rights (e.g., 1, 2), add value to students’ lives. When someone argues that accuracy and education don’t matter when it comes to protecting free speech, I find that much more convincing and honest.

A recent video by Natalie Wynn included a nuanced description of her response to Ricky Gervais telling transphobic jokes in his comedy specials. She made it clear that the thing that bothered her wasn’t that he’s allowed to tell those jokes (she’s a huge proponent of free speech) or even that the jokes are unoriginal, unfunny, or offensive. Rather, she’s afraid that he’s spreading untruthful ideas that make the world a harder place for people like her (she’s a trans woman). Her descriptions reflect the kind of complexity and clarity needed for productive conversations about the psychological effects of these types of speech.

*This paper describes the complexities of measuring discrimination in research.

**Individual differences between people and situations determine the extent to which any particular person will be affected by an event.

Information & Resources

Accurate information about trauma and posttraumatic stress disorder is available here.

For student organizer perspectives, listen to Hoai An Pham here (episode 10) and read Maximillian Alvarez’s article here.

Chris Martin‘s Half Hour of Heterodoxy podcast has featured guests with a variety of opinions on free speech and other campus-related issues.

Two particularly thoughtful academics who write about campus free speech issues are Aaron Hanlon and Jeffrey Sachs.

I’ve learned a lot about First Amendment litigation from reading work by Ken White and FIRE.

I co-wrote a blog post on college mental health that you can access here.

Acknowledgments

In preparation for the podcast, I reached out to three people with relevant expertise and experience: Dr. Yessenia Castro, Linda Gordon, and Carly Marten. They generously shared research, articles, resources, and their thoughts with me. I’m thankful for how much they deepen my understanding of these issues and for all that they do to make the world a better place.

A Short Guide to Everything You Need to Know About Eating Disorders

/ kgordonlab / 4 Comments

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In honor of National Eating Disorders Awareness Week, I will attempt to create a post that links to everything you need to know about eating disorders.*, **

*Or at least gets you within a couple of clicks of a lot of things that are good to know.

**Scientists and clinicians don’t actually know everything we need to know about eating disorders yet, but I’ll share what we do.

Definitions

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders includes formal definitions of eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, and others. Even if someone does not meet full diagnostic criteria for an eating disorder, they may still struggle with eating disorder symptoms such as body dissatisfaction, loss-of-control overeating or undereating, preoccupation with food, weight, or shape, or unhealthy weight loss behaviors (e.g., abusing laxatives, self-induced vomiting, compulsive exercise). If you’re curious about your own eating behavior, you can take an online screening here.

Causes

There are a variety of different factors that increase the risk for eating disorder symptoms. You can read about them here or see the biopsychosocial model below for some of the main factors associated with eating disorders.

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Treatments

Current research-supported eating disorder treatments include: family-based or Maudsley treatment, cognitive-behavioral therapy, integrative cognitive-affective therapy, and interpersonal psychotherapy.

There are also some scientifically-informed self-help books available:

Help Your Teenager Beat an Eating Disorder

Overcoming Binge Eating

The Body Image Workbook

Additional Eating Disorder-Related Topics

Activism

Emotion Regulation

How to Help A Loved One

The Marginalized Voices Project

Statistics

Suicide

Warning Signs

Weight Stigma

More Eating Disorder Resources

Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies

Academy for Eating Disorders

Find Treatment

Helpline

Maudsley Parents

Mirror-Mirror

National Eating Disorders Association

Podcast Episodes on Eating Disorders (1, 2, 3)

How Psychologists Capture the Complexities of Mental Illness

/ kgordonlab / 6 Comments

When it comes to understanding and treating mental illness, clinical psychologists must strike a balance between grouping people with shared characteristics together and recognizing people’s individual paths, circumstances, and needs. Below I’ve described some of the models that clinical psychologists use to reflect these complexities.

1) Biopsychosocial Model

Most modern psychologists understand that mental illness is the result of both nature and nurture. Accordingly, biopsychosocial models map out biological, psychological, and social risk factors for mental health outcomes and highlight potential intervention points. This model is so prominent that clinical psychology graduate programs require education in human development, individual differences, and biological, cognitive, affective, and social aspects of behavior, and you can’t become a licensed psychologist without passing a formal test on these topics. The idea is that mental health outcomes result from the interplay of biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors and that different people arrive at outcomes through different combinations of factors. Here’s a sample I constructed from some suicide risk factors:

biopsychosoc

2) Diathesis-Stress Model

People with identical genetics (i.e., monozygotic twins) and people with shared stressful events (e.g., witnessing the same violent act) can have different mental health outcomes. For example, many people with family histories of eating disorders will not develop eating disorders. Likewise, many people who have been bullied about their weight will not develop eating disorders. A diathesis-stress model of eating disorders explains this by saying that a person must have both a vulnerability (e.g., a genetic predisposition) and a significant stressor (e.g., weight-related bullying) to develop an eating disorder.

DSM

3) Multifinality and Equifinality

People who experience a similar event (e.g., trauma) can have disparate outcomes that depend on other factors (e.g., financial resources, societal views of survivors). This is called multifinality. Meanwhile, people with similar outcomes (e.g., posttraumatic stress disorder) can arrive there via distinct pathways (e.g., surviving sexual assault, a car accident, being the victim of gun violence). This is captured with the term equifinality.

EM

4) Distal vs. Proximal Factors

Most research on mental illness focuses on a few risk factors per study. Organizing findings across studies can feel like fitting puzzle pieces together to create a holistic picture. One way to do this is by grouping risk factors in terms of how far in time (distal) and how close in time (proximal) they are to the onset of mental illness. For example, strategies for reducing distal risk factors for adult depression may include public policy efforts to prevent childhood maltreatment, increase access to quality health care, and decrease discrimination. Meanwhile, therapy for individuals with depression may focus on more proximal factors (e.g., enhancing coping skills, increasing social support, behavioral activation).

distal proximal

5) Nomothetic vs. Idiographic

I highly recommend this article by Beltz, Wright, Sprague, and Molenaar (2016) for detailed definitions of these terms:nom idioFor example, imagine that a client gets diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). In order to figure out the best way to help, a therapist begins with nomothetic information (e.g., the diagnosis) to select a treatment. A randomized clinical trial suggests that a type of cognitive-behavioral therapy called exposure and response prevention (EX/RP) leads to significant improvement among 80% of people with OCD after 17 sessions. Based on available information, EX/RP is a good place to start. However, it’s possible that the client will be among the 20% of people who don’t respond to EX/RP. Therefore, therapists must also pay attention to idiographic information after initiating treatment (e.g., by regularly assessing the client’s OCD symptoms over time). If the client’s not responding to therapy, the idiographic data signal that the therapist must figure out why and make appropriate changes.

ni

For more information on nomothetic and idiographic approaches, check out:

Clinical Practice as Natural Laboratory for Psychotherapy Research: A Guide to Case-Based Time-Series Analysis

Clinical Versus Actuarial Judgment

Single-Case Experimental Designs for the Evaluation of Treatments for Self-Injurious and Suicidal Behaviors

What Can the Clinician Do Well?

I’ve described frameworks that clinical psychologists use to understand people’s mental health needs at multiple levels while respecting their individuality. The dedicated people working hard to alleviate suffering in the face of these challenges give me hope for the future of the field.

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Suicide is Not Reducible to Simple Explanations

/ kgordonlab / 1 Comment

It is unlikely that any one theory can explain phenomena as varied and complicated as human self-destructive acts. At the least, suicide involves an individual’s tortured and tunneled logic in a state of intolerable, inner-felt, idiosyncratically-defined anguish. 

-Edwin Shneidman, founder of contemporary suicidology

When criticizing aspects of society, some people amplify their arguments by saying that those aspects cause suicide. Typically, the claim goes something like this, “____ is so bad that it leads people to kill themselves. Therefore, it’s urgent that we stop ____.” You should be skeptical when you hear these kinds of claims, because suicide is not reducible to simple explanations. It hurts to think about people grieving a suicide loss and then hearing that there was a simple fix all along. This is especially painful when there is little or no evidence that ____ substantially increases suicide risk. Additionally, if an empirically-weak claim receives enough public attention, limited suicide prevention resources can be squandered in the wrong places.

How to Evaluate Causal Claims about Suicide

Suicide is complex, and it’s extremely challenging to conduct research that yields results with causal implications. The closest we have to experiments may be randomized controlled trials designed to reduce suicidality. Keeping in mind that the majority of suicide research is correlational, here’s one set of criteria that you can use to evaluate whether ____ causes suicide.

1) temporal precedence: If ____ causes suicide, ____ must occur before the suicide (or a societal change must precede changes in suicide rates). Non-experimental research can speak to this criterion through longitudinal studies or other examinations of suicide rate data over time. However, it’s important to look at long-term trends rather than capitalizing on specific time points with fluctuations that are consistent with the claim.

2) covariation: If ____ causes suicide, then changes in ____ must accompany changes in suicide rates. I often see partial demonstrations where someone will say, “Here are higher suicide rates coinciding with more of ____,” but then leave out the necessary counterpart of establishing correlation: less of ____ should also be associated with lower suicide rates. Both are required to meet this criterion, and you don’t need experimental studies if you examine it through naturally-occurring differences. For example:

-Looking at World Health Organization suicide data, do countries with more of ____ have higher suicide rates than countries with less of ____?

-Do demographic groups who experience more of ____ have higher suicide rates than groups with less of ____ over the same time period?

If the answer is “no,” then the covariation criterion has not been met.

3) nonspuriousness: If ____ causes suicide, then the relationship must persist even after ruling out alternative explanations. This criterion is arguably the most difficult to prove without experimental studies, but there are some correlational data that you’d expect to see if the claim is true. Questions to ask of such claims include:

-What else increased aside from ____ during the time period of increased suicide rates? Is there research linking those other factors to suicide, and could that better explain the observed pattern?

-Do people experiencing more of ____ also experience more of something else empirically-linked to suicide that could better explain the observed pattern?

Here‘s a strong example of someone evaluating an alternative explanation for an observed pattern using correlational data on a completely different topic (specifically, the part on self-censorship).

I wrote this post to share a framework for evaluating causal claims that I learned in grad school, and I hope that you find it useful. Even if it’s completely unintentional, when people use unsubstantiated claims about suicide to magnify societal concerns, it can feel exploitative of a group of people I care deeply about. Fortunately, this is outweighed by incredible, compassionate work reflecting the complexities and multiple pathways to suicide. I’ll link to some of my favorites below:

American Association of Suicidology

The Best Way to Save People from Suicide

The Interpersonal Theory of Suicide

Live Through This

Suicide Prevention Social Media Chat

The Three-Step Theory

We Tell Suicidal People to ‘Get Help.’ But What Happens When They Do?

Thank you for reading! Here’s a post with more information and resources about preventing suicide.

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