Posted by zazenduckie on December 5, 2006, at 10:13:22
In reply to Do you verify deaths Dr Bob?, posted by zazenduckie on November 30, 2006, at 11:28:18
Have you considered the possibility of suicide contagion in groups?
This is what is online concerning your personal perception of the events after another poster was reported to have died severa years ago. You know what Bob? I don't remember this group functioning as an effective "holding group" at all. Well actually how would you know whether anyone harmed herself or suicided? Jumping to conclusions weren't you? Maybe people didn't feel safe to report what they felt here due to your unusual policies or maybe they were blocked or maybe if they "suicided" nobody told you about it. There's still a post on usenet from those days from a member you chose to block during this event and she was in a great deal of distress. I don't think she felt "held" at all. She couldn't even get in touch with anyone here to find out where the funeral was. I feel your report was subjective &^&*%^% and not in keeping with the facts.
I hope you are not planning to continue to use professionally tragedies that occur on this board. Perhaps instead use that energy to reflect on the actual policies regarding publishing reports of others' deaths.
My opinion after observing your actions is that you care about the board, about making presentations about the board, and by extension about yourself.
By the way, probably coincidence but Pseudoname's last post was the same day Phillipa announced ASV's death.
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Excerpt of the presentationSuicide and the Internet
Robert C Hsiung, Azy Barak, Denise Silber
1 University of Chicago, Chicago, USA, 2 Israel University of Haifa, Israel, 3 France Basil Strategies, FranceIn this workshop, we explore the topic of suicide and the Internet from three perspectives. First, we report a suicide in an online peer support group in the United States. Next, we present an online suicide prevention service in Israel. Finally, we address the ethical responsibilities of the administrators of sites like these. This is, to our knowledge, the first report of a suicide in an online group. The group was a peer support message board focused on mental health and managed by a mental health professional. The reactions of the group members to the suicide was as varied as might have been expected in "real life" and included the wish for more information as well as outright disbelief; feelings of sadness, helplessness, anger, and loss; physical symptoms; remembrances of the deceased member; self-reflection; and support for each other. There were questions about the boundary between "e-life" and real life. Should group members use her real name? Go to her funeral? The board appeared to function as an effective "holding environment." No group members reported injuring themselves -- or were reported to have suicided -- in response. Administrative issues included notifying the institutional review board involved (the group was at the time considered a research study), ensuring that additional resources were available for those coping with crisis, and establishing some sort of memorial. A concern regarding the memorial was suicide "contagion." In the end, it simply linked to selected posts: remembrances, songs and poems, posts written to her *after* her suicide, and posts of her own, including ones about a previous suicide attempt and on her philosophy of suicide. The memorial area may function as a virtual cemetery for the virtual community. Having the administrator establish it may in part have served to reassure surviving group members that he cared about the deceased member -- and, by extension, about them.
http://www.hon.ch/Mednet2003/abstracts/371287659.html
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This is a news story re a proposed study of online suicide contagion.
The world’s first generation to double-click its way through elementary school is using the Web to stay connected — even in death, where the popularity of MySpace has given rise to MyDeathSpace.com. The site archives profiles of deceased MySpace members.
Psychologists wonder if such electronic farewells and self-memorials provide negative role models for teens in despair, encouraging suicide. University of South Florida researchers hope to answer that question.
Web sites frequented by teens are, in some cases, rife with talk of death. They acknowledge suicides that might be discreetly omitted from mainstream publications, which typically take a cue from mental health workers who warn of a contagion effect.
“Sometimes people get concerned when a young person is highlighted in the newspaper,” said Dr. Ilene R. Berson, associate professor of the Florida Mental Health Institute at the University of South Florida.
“People say other kids are going to hear about this and they’re going to relate with that young person, particularly if everyone is saying all these wonderful things,” Berson said.
Berson and a USF faculty team are seeking funding to study whether social networking web sites create a suicide contagion effect.
Researchers would design a computer algorithm to see if MySpace members who kill themselves have been linked online to other suicidal members. They will also tap into MyDeathSpace, which as of Friday, registered 55 suicides and 457 other deaths.
http://www.sptimes.com/2006/08/27/news_pf/Tampabay/_Online_death_dialogu.shtml
poster:zazenduckie
thread:708970
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20061202/msgs/710535.html