| I think these issues are grossly overstated. Let's look at the statistics (the newest from the US government are 2017). Around 79% of suicides are men. That edges up to around 82% in the 14-25 age group and down to 75% in the 10-14 age group (though the rate there is much lower). Suicide is the second biggest cause of death in the 15-24 age group. Furthermore, there is a youth suicide epidemic with the rate for the 15-24 age group going from 9.7 in 2007 up to 14.46 in 2017 (per 100K with most of that jump occurring in just the last 4 years). That's an almost 50% increase over the past decade generally speaking. Between 2016 and 2017 there's an abrupt jump of 1.3 per 100K. Most interesting to the study in question is the 10-14 age group. despite rises in other rates, their rate is basically unchanged until the year that show was released. At that point, we see a doubling of the suicide rate (from 0.73 to 1.34) for the 10-14 age from 2016 to 2017. That is definitely statistically significant. Suicide Contagion is a rather well-known effect. Furthermore, it is known that adolescents and young adults are particularly susceptible to this effect. Season 1 and 2 are very different (also reflected in their critic ratings). The first season has been out much longer than the second, so statistics there are probably more accurate. It may also be true that those who dealt with the first season and moved on to the second were less at risk to begin with. In addition, the show is about a bunch of high-school kids, so I'd guess they would find it more attractive than most dramas while lots of older people would find it less appealing. TL;DR: Males are generally the ones committing suicide. The show targets the age groups in question. Those age groups saw a big jump in suicide rates the year the show came out (including a group that had previously been all but unaffected by other changes). This all seems inline with the study in question. https://afsp.org/about-suicide/suicide-statistics/ https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide.shtml#par... https://www.hhs.gov/answers/mental-health-and-substance-abus... |