I'll shut up in a minute, after I report what I learned from a very
cursory glance at several apparently good statistical studies that I
found on the web, all of which use as their experimental sample all
of the known suicides in a given year or period of years.
We both made some bad assumptions, Alison. The differences in suicide
methods between males and females, for instance, isn't that great, as
I'd predicted it would be, based on what I know about the US, and as
you said, only 9% used guns. Among males and females the most
frequent method is hanging. And as we both knew men commit suicide 4
times more than women.
Then it gets interesting. For every completed male suicide there are
five attempts. For every completed female suicide there are 35
attempts. So that means that for every 35 female suicide attempts
there are 20 male suicide attempts. One conclusion might be that men
are less suicidal but better at it when they are suicidal. Sorry for
being facetious--call it gallows humor. I can think of a few other
possible explanations. Sounds like a subject for another study.
The higjhest rate of suicide for both men and women is age 30-34, not
early middle-age.
The most successful predictor of suicide is economic status--the less
an Australian makes, the more likely he, or she, is likely to commit suicide.
Aboriginals commit suicide for the most part younger than the rest,
before 29, and they kill themselves 40% more than the population average.
Except for the social class correlation it would seem that there
isn't enough evidence to draw complex conclusions. If I were a
government health service, though, I'd know where to intervene.
Mark
At 09:13 PM 3/31/2006, you wrote:
>On 1/4/06 10:00 AM, "Mark Weiss" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > Occam's razor, please.
>
>Does this mean I fail your class?
>
>I'm a little bored of being patronised and/or misread. So I'll shut up, to
>everyone's relief, I'm sure.
>
>Best
>
>A
>
>
>Alison Croggon
>
>Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
>Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
>Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
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