19 ms·

Schools opened, suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed

259 points by aaronbrethorst 5y ago

waynesonfire 5y ago
reddit removed this link due to not passing media bias.. interesting. https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaCoronavirus/comments/oqawe5/schools_opened_suicide_attempts_in_girls/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaCoronavirus/comments/oqawe5/s...
- MathYouF 5y ago
  The website the mod linked to is Mediabiasfactcheck.com The article is from Inside Medicine published via Bulletin.com by author Jeremy Faust. I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided. If we want to have a conversation about the mods decision and if it should give us pause, we'll first have to understand the reasoning (or verify if it's even credible) of the mod.
  - throwawaysea 5y ago
    As an aside: Media Bias/Fact Check is not a reputable source for measurements of media bias. They might get some ratings correct, but I also see them regularly basing ratings off of a few cherry-picked articles rather than a broader body of articles, in a way that suggests to me that they are purposeful in painting a selective picture of bias. They don't have a systematic methodology to determine bias. The Columbia Journalism Review wrote about this a few years ago as they were gaining popularity (https://www.cjr.org/innovations/measure-media-bias-partisan.php https://www.cjr.org/innovations/measure-media-bias-partisan....), noting that their ratings are basically the opinions of a small group of people. All Sides has a better bias ratings database (https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings) and is more honest about what their methodology is and what the limitations are (https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-rating-methods https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-rating-method...).
  - jorams 5y ago
    > I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided. The relevant rule is "Use Reliable Sources" and the subreddit seems focused on facts and statistics. I think it makes sense to default to disallowing random websites not reviewed by the source they've chosen for bias review.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- geofft 5y ago
  "Reddit" didn't remove the link, an individual volunteer moderator of the specific subreddit removed it. Saying that Reddit removed it is like saying that GitHub rejected my pull request to Docker.
  - waynesonfire 5y ago
    reddit is a community made up of the moderators, contributors, editors, lurkers, and also the company that finances it. Without them reddit doesn't exist. so reddit did remove the link, for if such behavior wasn't tolerated it would be cancelled, just as this post is being down-voted. if you want to get more specific about it, that's great. thanks for pointing it out. it's irrelevant to my intentions. and don't worry, github removes PRs too, https://torrentfreak.com/dmca-notice-wipes-reverse-engineered-gta-code-from-github-210221/ https://torrentfreak.com/dmca-notice-wipes-reverse-engineere...
    - malwarebytess 5y ago
      They're hinting to you that complaining that a moderator of a small forum somewhere on the internet removing your article is not particularly interesting or valuable.
- throwawaysea 5y ago
  A number of the biggest coronavirus subreddits also openly censor articles and ban users for the slightest violation of their biases. For example if you share articles or studies that suggest lockdowns are illogical, or that the virus may have originated from a lab leak, or that the infection fatality rate is low, you would see your discussions closed and potentially get a permanent ban from those subreddits. Perhaps the mods of some of these subreddits have relaxed things over time, but the rampant censorship practiced by mods on Reddit often creates echo chambers and prevents society from seeking the truth more efficiently.
  - hda111 5y ago
    It’s not censorship if some admins (private persons) decide they don’t want it. Try discussing Windows topics in a Linux subreddit. If I had a blog with comment function and someone writes a comment I don’t like I’m not forced to publish it. It’s the same situation. The solution is of course decentralization and self hosting communities and not blaming reddit for decisions of individual admins.
isthisreality 5y ago
Not a fan of "skyrocketed" in this headline. Just tell us the statistic.
- isthisreality 5y ago
  > During February 21–March 20, 2021, suspected suicide attempt ED visits were 50.6% higher among girls aged 12–17 years than during the same period in 2019; among boys aged 12–17 years, suspected suicide attempt ED visits increased 3.7%. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7024e1.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7024e1.htm
  - isthisreality 5y ago
    Comparatively speaking, at least gender-wise, this data should be taken with a grain of salt. Males are historically more effective at killing themselves. This data only looks at ED visits and you don't go to the hospital when you're clearly dead. And if you assume "suicide attempt" is using the technical definition [1], they're only looking at ED visits where the patient did not die. Males aged 15 to 24 were 4x as likely to succeed in killing themselves in 2019. [2] [1]: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide (see Definitions) [2]: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide (see Figure 2)
    - prepend 5y ago
      Yet did the successful suicide rate in males increase to compensate? It seems like you have a duty, out of politeness, to at least address whether you attempted to address this. Bringing up makes suicide rates vs female without trying to address if that explains a 50v3% increase in attempts isn’t very helpful, or interesting.
      - isthisreality 5y ago
        Maybe instead of complaining, you can look it up yourself and contribute the data to this thread.
corndoge 5y ago
"We found the correlation to be very strong, which is the highest category statistically possible" What?
- Solstinox 5y ago
  I can see the Far Side Comic that never was. "Having been burned one too many times by putting lines through shotgun blasts, scientists switched to correlation categories."
  - neonnoodle 5y ago
    Divide study results into tranches with AAA, AA, and B ratings.
    - voisin 5y ago
      Meta analyses as collateralized bonds that let scientists argue whatever they want!
    - somehnacct3757 5y ago
      Get a former journal reviewer to claim the tranch of B papers contains, in sum, the same amount of good science as an AAA paper. I like where this is going
      - nullc 5y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-analysis
- rob_c 5y ago
  Not exactly an n-sigma statement with the result of double blind, or look elsewhere... Disappointingly that does read a little close to "I found what I was looking for so stopped looking" which makes me want to grab the author and interrogate them over zoom into they hang up.
TaupeRanger 5y ago
Not sure why the hyperbolic headline, when the article itself just says, paraphrasing, "there might not be any causal relationship between schools being open and suicide attempts, and that goes against the prevailing anti-closing narrative".
- endisneigh 5y ago
  There’s no contradiction between your quote and the headline: schools opened and suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed, but the relationship isn't necessarily causal.
  - TaupeRanger 5y ago
    Kind of a silly reply. The headline could've just avoided the implication. Imagine the headline: "women started eating more beans, and birth defects skyrocketed". What will people assume, regardless of the content of the article? It's clickbaity, that's the problem.
    - endisneigh 5y ago
      What's clickbaity about it though? Schools opened and suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed. I didn't necessarily think it was causal, but rather a correlation. I mean if you read the article then what they're trying to say is clear in any case. YMMV.
mensetmanusman 5y ago
“ In writing this, I have found the surprising reverse correlation between suicidal behavior and time spent in school—both prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and during it—gnawing at me. Could it be that the pressures around school itself are among the most important stressors related to suicidality among teens? If that’s so, the underlying reasons could be related either to academic or social pressures. Regardless, no one would argue that we should do away with in-person learning just because more time spent in the classroom appears to be associated with increased rates of attempted or completed suicide.” One could argue that in person schooling should be an option moving forward.
- retrac 5y ago
  Could that just be... delaying the inevitable? Sorry to phrase it like that. At some point your daughter has to come into contact with others. If it's a social effect -- and I suspect it is -- then exposure to the self-image issues, or bullying, or status competition, or whatever it is at work here, might just lead to suicides when exposed to these things in college, rather than in high school. While the focus is mostly on teenagers, young adult women of college age, also seem to have been strongly affected by the pre-pandemic spike we were seeing already.
  - wizzwizz4 5y ago
    The school system is a highly abusive environment, in many places. Young adults doing meaningless busywork in a highly-restrictive environment with artificial social dynamics is bad enough without some of them being modelled off prisons.
    - spoonjim 5y ago
      The busywork is a huge aspect of it. I used to have very compulsive behaviors that pretty much ended when I had the responsibility of a family to take care of. Teenagers have too much mind power and too little responsibility for it... when people were getting married at 17/21 there was not as much time to stew over things.
    - 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
BurningFrog 5y ago
Supports the "Hell is other people" theory.
- Zababa 5y ago
  Also supports my "School is hell" theory.
retrac 5y ago
There was something very off before the pandemic. Girls were already diverging sharply from the historical norm and from boys over the last few years: https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/b90a0580-c178-417a-b6d0-b360de1eef56/gr1ab.jpg https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachme... "Sex- and Age-specific Increases in Suicide Attempts by Self-Poisoning in the United States among Youth and Young Adults from 2000 to 2018". It's disproportionately a specific method (poisoning) and it is gender-localized and somewhat social class-localized. This hints at a social contagion.
- mprovost 5y ago
  Instagram was founded in 2010.
  - retrac 5y ago
    I fear that it may be as simple as that. Because if that's the cause, I'm not sure we can fix it.
    - prepend 5y ago
      Pi-hole blocking Instagram works pretty well for me, although not perfectly. We can also treat this like smoking and opioids and lawsuit/tax excessively instagram and use it to pay for public mental health services. It seems like there will be a clear evidence trail that Instagram knowingly marketed and permitted use of their app by children under 13. So that’s some future administration/state AG payday, I think.
      - retrac 5y ago
        You are right. I should not be defeatist. If social media is truly ruining our mental health (it's not really an "if" anymore, is it?) then it is both reasonable and necessary to start doing something along those lines.
    - spoonjim 5y ago
      The Clean Air Act provided a legal framework to fix air pollution. We need a similar approach to fix mind pollution. I don’t think this is impossible because Zuckerberg has managed to piss off apparently everyone across the political spectrum. If it was someone like Steve Jobs I would say the problem would be much harder.
vfclists 5y ago
Do you guys mind not providing links to website that insist that you they allow you to every damn data collection agency to track you before you enter?
- alpaca128 5y ago
  The way they handle cookies is very questionable to put it mildly. Their popup asks if I want to accept cookies but then there is literally no other button than the one saying "accept all".
- markovbot 5y ago
  site does not load with javascript disabled. But does show me a <title> tag that implies it's a Facebook product, so I'm definitely not going to enable javascript.
brohee 5y ago
Do they have split stats for girls attending all girls school? Bullying is often the root cause of teenage suicide, and I wonder wether a mixed environment makes it better or worse...
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  All-girls schools are pretty rare in the US aren’t they?
  - SavantIdiot 5y ago
    They are mostly catholic schools. E.g., https://www.sacredhearthamden.org/ https://www.sacredhearthamden.org/
  - damnedspot 5y ago
    They're uncommon outside of pricey prep schools. Interesting question, but the data would be tough to speculate with since there would be such an income difference between those girls and the statistically average American girl.
- throwawayboise 5y ago
  I would think worse. The underlying driver of the social posturing and inter-clique battling by adolescent girls is trying to be more visible/popular with boys.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    If there are gender segregated schools that just means heightened fomo+posturing. There is no way in which post-pubuscent humans are going to ingore the other gender school's existence.
joezydeco 5y ago
I witnessed this first hand. My daughter is in this age bracket and our school was 100% remote up until the spring of 2021. The return to school was hybrid, two days a week, and divided 50/50 by alphabet. Her anxiety levels went through the roof. Thankfully we didn't get to an extreme case of suicidal ideation but things were pretty bad for a while. Medication has helped, but getting a therapist appointment is nearly impossible. They're 110% booked. What we understand is that during the shutdown the 'alpha' girls all coalesced on social media and shut everyone else out. They also took vacations, had slumber parties, and did a ton of things that everyone else was avoiding because those families tried to listen to the current advice. When the return to school happened these cliques instantly had fresh prey: the unconnected, the minorities, the non-english speakers, the ones that didn't purchase new clothing over the lockdown, the ones that didn't go to the slumber parties and vacations. And half of your friends/allies were in the other side of the alphabet and working from home. This is all stuff that boys of this age don't care about. But the girls are vicious. Two of our friends have physically relocated out of the district, two others are going to change schools. TLDR: Preteen girls are awful, and always have been, but the lockdown concentrated and amplified it to horrific proportions.
- twelve40 5y ago
  > Two of our friends have physically relocated out of the district, two others are going to change schools. how would that even help though? was what you are describing specific to this school then? would moving to another, unfamiliar group of preteen girls just add to anxiety? (in my case, relatively sheltered boys so i don't see much of this... for now, anyway)
  - mandmandam 5y ago
    As someone who relocated to many different schools, I can tell you that a different school can work wonders. It's a fresh start, in a new environment, without the local prejudices and grudges.
  - anon9001 5y ago
    The goal is just for time to pass in the least unpleasant way possible, so moving to a fresh group would buy some time before the same problems become unbearable again. Pretty much the same reason we change jobs.
hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
I have a theory I'd propose: The biggest cause of teen suicide is essentially feeling rejected in some way by your peers: being bullied, a breakup, "mean girl" switches from former friends, etc. When schools closed, the immediate pressure of any of these negative social interactions went to the background (or at least simmered on social media). When schools reopened, kids tried to figure out where they fit back in the "totem pole" of adolescent social hierarchy, and the rise in suicides is a result of kids not figuring out where they fit in when they went back.
- bloopernova 5y ago
  Anecdotally: I was bullied a lot in school. When I became avoidant and just stayed at home, I was a lot happier because I didn't have those stressors.
  - voisin 5y ago
    I concur. Perhaps the break from schools opened their eyes to the notion that life didn’t have to be the total hell that it is for a lot of young kids and then being forced back was too much to handle, on top of all of the other stuff everyone has been struggling with this last year.
  - hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
    Agreed. Honestly, there are many times I've been very thankful that I grew up in an age before social media. At least when I went home the torment would stop and I could relax somewhat. I think kids who are bullied today have it so much worse with the ever presence of cellphones and the internet.
  - bazooka_penguin 5y ago
    Public school was probably the most miserable part of my life, especially as one of the only asians in a black and white heavy school district. The few years my parents afforded private school to get me away from the violence was only a little better. Moving to Southern California where the schools had significantly more asians was a big improvement. Needless to say, I'm not a fan of public schooling and the one size fits all approach
Dumblydorr 5y ago
This data isn't that convincing, a lot of factors go into this messy correlation between ED visits for girl suicide attempts and covid closure of schools. The title of the link doesn't mention ED visits for attempts, which is the actual outcome of interest here, so IMO the link title is too strongly worded from an epidemiologists viewpoint. Now conjecturing as to correlation confounders. Maybe the girls need more time at home with pets, family, hobbies, more time in their yard, less time exposed to commuting and classes they don't want to take or people they don't want to see. School is such a diverse set of stressors and the data here isn't clear to begin with... A more verified takeaway is that girls attempted suicide around 2X more often than boys. This we know has something to do with technology and social media, whereas the schools opening is still potentially spuriously linked.
- isthisreality 5y ago
  The higher attempt rate for girls is probably due to boys being more effective at killing themselves (4x as effective, in fact). https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27942628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27942628
  - azth 5y ago
    What does the effectiveness of suicide have to do with the rate at which people attempt it?
    - aesh2Xa1 5y ago
      A successful attempt results in no further attempts.
      - azth 5y ago
        That's true. However, do the statistics count the same people reattempting?
        aesh2Xa1 5y ago
xyzzyx 5y ago
It's almost as if putting kids in a peer-pressure-cooker environment is a bad idea? I might be biased, I'm autistic and my high school experiences were abhorrent and ended up scarring me for life. Primary school and college were fine, but high school? Forget about it, absolute bloody nightmare :)
- goatse-4-this 5y ago
  I was popular, even a bit of a bully at times, and I agree with you 100%. I was cruel to others because I was miserable myself. I hated every single second of the excruciating boredom of being forced to sit down and shut up for 8 hours a day. The US education system is fucking garbage.
rob_c 5y ago
Did they attempt to take the analysis back in time to use the larger dataset of schools being closed. I.e. Has teen suicide in America always been higher when schools were open always, or is this somehow unique to the extra closures?
- loeg 5y ago
  > That’s not unexpected. Suicide death rates (for which we have decades of reliable data) among teens and young adults predictably fall during summer months, and also in December—that is, times when schools are the least in session. So, what our graphs above show, an apparent inverse correlation between school closings and suicidal behavior, is not unique to the Covid-19 pandemic.
  - rob_c 5y ago
    Thanks! Ah hadn't noticed that and was struggling to paste the info graphic. Would love to see the decorrolation displayed graphically but that's just the way I read data
vmception 5y ago
> Regardless, no one would argue that we should do away with in-person learning just because more time spent in the classroom appears to be associated with increased rates of attempted or completed suicide. But it is an upsetting insight, nonetheless. This suggests that the predisposed or susceptible population is weeded out by adulthood, yes? Seems like a good enough reason to keep the status quo, while others continue research about the actual reason, assuming there is consensus on decreasing it.
idanman 5y ago
This reminds me of the documentary Race to Nowhere. They talk about the high suicide rate amongst teens due to burn out from school and how some were brought back from the brink. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_to_Nowhere https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_to_Nowhere
techlaw 5y ago
Could not access the article but it appears to reference this CDC MMWR from June 18, 2021: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7024e1-H.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7024e1-H.pdf [I've included the link to the CDC report above and the summary below because this information is important and should be accessible (i.e. should not require allowing fbcdn.net trackers). I also prefer the source to somebody's interpretation. If the original article provides additional insight I'd like to see a non-FB link to it, my admittedly quick scan of the comments did not spot one.] From the SUMMARY of that report: What is already known about this topic? During 2020, the proportion of mental health–related emergency department (ED) visits among adolescents aged 12–17 years increased 31% compared with that during 2019. What is added by this report? In May 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, ED visits for suspected suicide attempts began to increase among adolescents aged 12–17 years, especially girls. During February 21–March 20, 2021, suspected suicide attempt ED visits were 50.6% higher among girls aged 12–17 years than during the same period in 2019; among boys aged 12–17 years, suspected suicide attempt ED visits increased 3.7%. What are the implications for public health practice? Suicide prevention requires a comprehensive approach that is adapted during times of infrastructure disruption, involves multisectoral partnerships and implements evidence-based strategies to address the range of factors influencing suicide risk.
I_cape_runts 5y ago
Oof
Animats 5y ago
"When schools closed, suspected suicide attempts actually decreased. When schools reopened, suspected suicide attempts skyrocketed in lockstep." From the way the data is presented, it's not clear that there was a net change either way. Maybe this just concentrated suicides around school reopening times.
aaron695 5y ago
This is exactly as expected? I don't understand? They have lost resilience and are back under stress again. We damaged them, now we'll see the results. Exactly to narrative. Is the article something about girls and not boys? Boys will take a little longer before we see any jump if it's as expected. The death of a child can have less immediate stress than a overseas beach holiday. Are we confusing emotions that are not stress, like grief or loneliness or boredom
kaminar 5y ago
Once again proof that men are more successful.
ineedasername 5y ago
The number of reported suicide attempts decreased during school closures. That might mean actual attempts decreased too, but it could also be another piece of fallout from people deferring treatment because they or their families didn't want exposure to COVID. Or mental health services were over burdened by increased issues from other areas of the population. Or it really was going back to a school environment that is often socially toxic. Or some combination of these and other factors.
- qwerty456127 5y ago
  To me it seems school environment always is extremely toxic. Probably the most toxic thing I can imagine. Perhaps prisons are worse but I'm not sure.
jokethrowaway 5y ago
While I believe schools to be terrible (great for seeing, meeting people; terrible for the forced curriculum down your throat part), I disagree with the author's reading (even if correlation doesn't imply causation) that points at school being bad for kids. This could very well be the effect of a year of lockdown and having to go back in the real world. If that's the case, we'll see the number of suicides drop over the next years. Lockdowns caused me to fall into depression again but I never thought about killing myself. There was always hope that things would eventually go back to normal, you were . Now that the normal is back and I'm confronted with a reality which is partially worse than lockdown times (eg. having to go back to the office for employees, having to go to school instead of studying on zoom for students) I have a year of mental issues which I didn't fix, I'm burnt out, there is nothing else to wait for which will magically improve my life and I'm faced with the challenges of the pre-lockdown world. It doesn't surprise me to see suicides going up.
harleypig 5y ago
I have a personal knowledge of what comes from suicides and suicide attempts. It is something that needs to be addressed. I have issues with this article, as well as with the owner of the 'bulletin.com' domain. This article flips between discussing 'suicide attempts' and 'suicides' as if they are interchangeable, while only showing the data on 'suicide attempts'. This bothers me. "In fact, suicide attempts in adolescent girls dropped to rates similar to those seen in the summer of 2019. That’s not unexpected. Suicide death rates (for which we have decades of reliable data) among teens and young adults predictably fall during summer months, and also in December—that is, times when schools are the least in session." (emphasis mine) 'Suicide deaths' and 'suicide attempts' are not interchaneable.
xyzzy21 5y ago
Can you say "Social Media"?! The connection to anxiety, bullying and depression has already been demonstrated with adult women. It should be a surprise that young girls are worse affected. Men/boys mostly don't care about social attention and approval in ways that are amped up on Social Media. Yes we are different!

reddit removed this link due to not passing media bias.. interesting. https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaCoronavirus/comments/oqawe5/schools_opened_suicide_attempts_in_girls/ https://www.reddit.com/r/CanadaCoronavirus/comments/oqawe5/s...

MathYouF 5y ago
The website the mod linked to is Mediabiasfactcheck.com The article is from Inside Medicine published via Bulletin.com by author Jeremy Faust. I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided. If we want to have a conversation about the mods decision and if it should give us pause, we'll first have to understand the reasoning (or verify if it's even credible) of the mod.
- throwawaysea 5y ago
  As an aside: Media Bias/Fact Check is not a reputable source for measurements of media bias. They might get some ratings correct, but I also see them regularly basing ratings off of a few cherry-picked articles rather than a broader body of articles, in a way that suggests to me that they are purposeful in painting a selective picture of bias. They don't have a systematic methodology to determine bias. The Columbia Journalism Review wrote about this a few years ago as they were gaining popularity (https://www.cjr.org/innovations/measure-media-bias-partisan.php https://www.cjr.org/innovations/measure-media-bias-partisan....), noting that their ratings are basically the opinions of a small group of people. All Sides has a better bias ratings database (https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings) and is more honest about what their methodology is and what the limitations are (https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-rating-methods https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-rating-method...).
- jorams 5y ago
  > I can't find any of the above sources listed on the site provided. The relevant rule is "Use Reliable Sources" and the subreddit seems focused on facts and statistics. I think it makes sense to default to disallowing random websites not reviewed by the source they've chosen for bias review.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
geofft 5y ago
"Reddit" didn't remove the link, an individual volunteer moderator of the specific subreddit removed it. Saying that Reddit removed it is like saying that GitHub rejected my pull request to Docker.
- waynesonfire 5y ago
  reddit is a community made up of the moderators, contributors, editors, lurkers, and also the company that finances it. Without them reddit doesn't exist. so reddit did remove the link, for if such behavior wasn't tolerated it would be cancelled, just as this post is being down-voted. if you want to get more specific about it, that's great. thanks for pointing it out. it's irrelevant to my intentions. and don't worry, github removes PRs too, https://torrentfreak.com/dmca-notice-wipes-reverse-engineered-gta-code-from-github-210221/ https://torrentfreak.com/dmca-notice-wipes-reverse-engineere...
  - malwarebytess 5y ago
    They're hinting to you that complaining that a moderator of a small forum somewhere on the internet removing your article is not particularly interesting or valuable.
throwawaysea 5y ago
A number of the biggest coronavirus subreddits also openly censor articles and ban users for the slightest violation of their biases. For example if you share articles or studies that suggest lockdowns are illogical, or that the virus may have originated from a lab leak, or that the infection fatality rate is low, you would see your discussions closed and potentially get a permanent ban from those subreddits. Perhaps the mods of some of these subreddits have relaxed things over time, but the rampant censorship practiced by mods on Reddit often creates echo chambers and prevents society from seeking the truth more efficiently.
- hda111 5y ago
  It’s not censorship if some admins (private persons) decide they don’t want it. Try discussing Windows topics in a Linux subreddit. If I had a blog with comment function and someone writes a comment I don’t like I’m not forced to publish it. It’s the same situation. The solution is of course decentralization and self hosting communities and not blaming reddit for decisions of individual admins.

isthisreality 5y ago

Not a fan of "skyrocketed" in this headline. Just tell us the statistic.

isthisreality 5y ago
> During February 21–March 20, 2021, suspected suicide attempt ED visits were 50.6% higher among girls aged 12–17 years than during the same period in 2019; among boys aged 12–17 years, suspected suicide attempt ED visits increased 3.7%. https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7024e1.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7024e1.htm
- isthisreality 5y ago
  Comparatively speaking, at least gender-wise, this data should be taken with a grain of salt. Males are historically more effective at killing themselves. This data only looks at ED visits and you don't go to the hospital when you're clearly dead. And if you assume "suicide attempt" is using the technical definition [1], they're only looking at ED visits where the patient did not die. Males aged 15 to 24 were 4x as likely to succeed in killing themselves in 2019. [2] [1]: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide (see Definitions) [2]: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/statistics/suicide (see Figure 2)
  - prepend 5y ago
    Yet did the successful suicide rate in males increase to compensate? It seems like you have a duty, out of politeness, to at least address whether you attempted to address this. Bringing up makes suicide rates vs female without trying to address if that explains a 50v3% increase in attempts isn’t very helpful, or interesting.
    - isthisreality 5y ago
      Maybe instead of complaining, you can look it up yourself and contribute the data to this thread.

corndoge 5y ago

"We found the correlation to be very strong, which is the highest category statistically possible" What?

Solstinox 5y ago
I can see the Far Side Comic that never was. "Having been burned one too many times by putting lines through shotgun blasts, scientists switched to correlation categories."
- neonnoodle 5y ago
  Divide study results into tranches with AAA, AA, and B ratings.
  - voisin 5y ago
    Meta analyses as collateralized bonds that let scientists argue whatever they want!
  - somehnacct3757 5y ago
    Get a former journal reviewer to claim the tranch of B papers contains, in sum, the same amount of good science as an AAA paper. I like where this is going
    - nullc 5y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta-analysis
rob_c 5y ago
Not exactly an n-sigma statement with the result of double blind, or look elsewhere... Disappointingly that does read a little close to "I found what I was looking for so stopped looking" which makes me want to grab the author and interrogate them over zoom into they hang up.

TaupeRanger 5y ago

Not sure why the hyperbolic headline, when the article itself just says, paraphrasing, "there might not be any causal relationship between schools being open and suicide attempts, and that goes against the prevailing anti-closing narrative".

endisneigh 5y ago
There’s no contradiction between your quote and the headline: schools opened and suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed, but the relationship isn't necessarily causal.
- TaupeRanger 5y ago
  Kind of a silly reply. The headline could've just avoided the implication. Imagine the headline: "women started eating more beans, and birth defects skyrocketed". What will people assume, regardless of the content of the article? It's clickbaity, that's the problem.
  - endisneigh 5y ago
    What's clickbaity about it though? Schools opened and suicide attempts in girls skyrocketed. I didn't necessarily think it was causal, but rather a correlation. I mean if you read the article then what they're trying to say is clear in any case. YMMV.

mensetmanusman 5y ago

“ In writing this, I have found the surprising reverse correlation between suicidal behavior and time spent in school—both prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and during it—gnawing at me. Could it be that the pressures around school itself are among the most important stressors related to suicidality among teens? If that’s so, the underlying reasons could be related either to academic or social pressures. Regardless, no one would argue that we should do away with in-person learning just because more time spent in the classroom appears to be associated with increased rates of attempted or completed suicide.” One could argue that in person schooling should be an option moving forward.

retrac 5y ago
Could that just be... delaying the inevitable? Sorry to phrase it like that. At some point your daughter has to come into contact with others. If it's a social effect -- and I suspect it is -- then exposure to the self-image issues, or bullying, or status competition, or whatever it is at work here, might just lead to suicides when exposed to these things in college, rather than in high school. While the focus is mostly on teenagers, young adult women of college age, also seem to have been strongly affected by the pre-pandemic spike we were seeing already.
- wizzwizz4 5y ago
  The school system is a highly abusive environment, in many places. Young adults doing meaningless busywork in a highly-restrictive environment with artificial social dynamics is bad enough without some of them being modelled off prisons.
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    The busywork is a huge aspect of it. I used to have very compulsive behaviors that pretty much ended when I had the responsibility of a family to take care of. Teenagers have too much mind power and too little responsibility for it... when people were getting married at 17/21 there was not as much time to stew over things.
  - 5y ago

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BurningFrog 5y ago

Supports the "Hell is other people" theory.

Zababa 5y ago
Also supports my "School is hell" theory.

retrac 5y ago

There was something very off before the pandemic. Girls were already diverging sharply from the historical norm and from boys over the last few years: https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/b90a0580-c178-417a-b6d0-b360de1eef56/gr1ab.jpg https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachme... "Sex- and Age-specific Increases in Suicide Attempts by Self-Poisoning in the United States among Youth and Young Adults from 2000 to 2018". It's disproportionately a specific method (poisoning) and it is gender-localized and somewhat social class-localized. This hints at a social contagion.

mprovost 5y ago
Instagram was founded in 2010.
- retrac 5y ago
  I fear that it may be as simple as that. Because if that's the cause, I'm not sure we can fix it.
  - prepend 5y ago
    Pi-hole blocking Instagram works pretty well for me, although not perfectly. We can also treat this like smoking and opioids and lawsuit/tax excessively instagram and use it to pay for public mental health services. It seems like there will be a clear evidence trail that Instagram knowingly marketed and permitted use of their app by children under 13. So that’s some future administration/state AG payday, I think.
    - retrac 5y ago
      You are right. I should not be defeatist. If social media is truly ruining our mental health (it's not really an "if" anymore, is it?) then it is both reasonable and necessary to start doing something along those lines.
  - spoonjim 5y ago
    The Clean Air Act provided a legal framework to fix air pollution. We need a similar approach to fix mind pollution. I don’t think this is impossible because Zuckerberg has managed to piss off apparently everyone across the political spectrum. If it was someone like Steve Jobs I would say the problem would be much harder.

vfclists 5y ago

Do you guys mind not providing links to website that insist that you they allow you to every damn data collection agency to track you before you enter?

alpaca128 5y ago
The way they handle cookies is very questionable to put it mildly. Their popup asks if I want to accept cookies but then there is literally no other button than the one saying "accept all".
markovbot 5y ago
site does not load with javascript disabled. But does show me a <title> tag that implies it's a Facebook product, so I'm definitely not going to enable javascript.

brohee 5y ago

Do they have split stats for girls attending all girls school? Bullying is often the root cause of teenage suicide, and I wonder wether a mixed environment makes it better or worse...

chrisseaton 5y ago
All-girls schools are pretty rare in the US aren’t they?
- SavantIdiot 5y ago
  They are mostly catholic schools. E.g., https://www.sacredhearthamden.org/ https://www.sacredhearthamden.org/
- damnedspot 5y ago
  They're uncommon outside of pricey prep schools. Interesting question, but the data would be tough to speculate with since there would be such an income difference between those girls and the statistically average American girl.
throwawayboise 5y ago
I would think worse. The underlying driver of the social posturing and inter-clique battling by adolescent girls is trying to be more visible/popular with boys.
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  If there are gender segregated schools that just means heightened fomo+posturing. There is no way in which post-pubuscent humans are going to ingore the other gender school's existence.

joezydeco 5y ago

I witnessed this first hand. My daughter is in this age bracket and our school was 100% remote up until the spring of 2021. The return to school was hybrid, two days a week, and divided 50/50 by alphabet. Her anxiety levels went through the roof. Thankfully we didn't get to an extreme case of suicidal ideation but things were pretty bad for a while. Medication has helped, but getting a therapist appointment is nearly impossible. They're 110% booked. What we understand is that during the shutdown the 'alpha' girls all coalesced on social media and shut everyone else out. They also took vacations, had slumber parties, and did a ton of things that everyone else was avoiding because those families tried to listen to the current advice. When the return to school happened these cliques instantly had fresh prey: the unconnected, the minorities, the non-english speakers, the ones that didn't purchase new clothing over the lockdown, the ones that didn't go to the slumber parties and vacations. And half of your friends/allies were in the other side of the alphabet and working from home. This is all stuff that boys of this age don't care about. But the girls are vicious. Two of our friends have physically relocated out of the district, two others are going to change schools. TLDR: Preteen girls are awful, and always have been, but the lockdown concentrated and amplified it to horrific proportions.

twelve40 5y ago
> Two of our friends have physically relocated out of the district, two others are going to change schools. how would that even help though? was what you are describing specific to this school then? would moving to another, unfamiliar group of preteen girls just add to anxiety? (in my case, relatively sheltered boys so i don't see much of this... for now, anyway)
- mandmandam 5y ago
  As someone who relocated to many different schools, I can tell you that a different school can work wonders. It's a fresh start, in a new environment, without the local prejudices and grudges.
- anon9001 5y ago
  The goal is just for time to pass in the least unpleasant way possible, so moving to a fresh group would buy some time before the same problems become unbearable again. Pretty much the same reason we change jobs.

hn_throwaway_99 5y ago

I have a theory I'd propose: The biggest cause of teen suicide is essentially feeling rejected in some way by your peers: being bullied, a breakup, "mean girl" switches from former friends, etc. When schools closed, the immediate pressure of any of these negative social interactions went to the background (or at least simmered on social media). When schools reopened, kids tried to figure out where they fit back in the "totem pole" of adolescent social hierarchy, and the rise in suicides is a result of kids not figuring out where they fit in when they went back.

bloopernova 5y ago
Anecdotally: I was bullied a lot in school. When I became avoidant and just stayed at home, I was a lot happier because I didn't have those stressors.
- voisin 5y ago
  I concur. Perhaps the break from schools opened their eyes to the notion that life didn’t have to be the total hell that it is for a lot of young kids and then being forced back was too much to handle, on top of all of the other stuff everyone has been struggling with this last year.
- hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
  Agreed. Honestly, there are many times I've been very thankful that I grew up in an age before social media. At least when I went home the torment would stop and I could relax somewhat. I think kids who are bullied today have it so much worse with the ever presence of cellphones and the internet.
- bazooka_penguin 5y ago
  Public school was probably the most miserable part of my life, especially as one of the only asians in a black and white heavy school district. The few years my parents afforded private school to get me away from the violence was only a little better. Moving to Southern California where the schools had significantly more asians was a big improvement. Needless to say, I'm not a fan of public schooling and the one size fits all approach

Dumblydorr 5y ago

This data isn't that convincing, a lot of factors go into this messy correlation between ED visits for girl suicide attempts and covid closure of schools. The title of the link doesn't mention ED visits for attempts, which is the actual outcome of interest here, so IMO the link title is too strongly worded from an epidemiologists viewpoint. Now conjecturing as to correlation confounders. Maybe the girls need more time at home with pets, family, hobbies, more time in their yard, less time exposed to commuting and classes they don't want to take or people they don't want to see. School is such a diverse set of stressors and the data here isn't clear to begin with... A more verified takeaway is that girls attempted suicide around 2X more often than boys. This we know has something to do with technology and social media, whereas the schools opening is still potentially spuriously linked.

isthisreality 5y ago
The higher attempt rate for girls is probably due to boys being more effective at killing themselves (4x as effective, in fact). https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27942628 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27942628
- azth 5y ago
  What does the effectiveness of suicide have to do with the rate at which people attempt it?
  - aesh2Xa1 5y ago
    A successful attempt results in no further attempts.
    - azth 5y ago
      That's true. However, do the statistics count the same people reattempting?
      - aesh2Xa1 5y ago

xyzzyx 5y ago

It's almost as if putting kids in a peer-pressure-cooker environment is a bad idea? I might be biased, I'm autistic and my high school experiences were abhorrent and ended up scarring me for life. Primary school and college were fine, but high school? Forget about it, absolute bloody nightmare :)

goatse-4-this 5y ago
I was popular, even a bit of a bully at times, and I agree with you 100%. I was cruel to others because I was miserable myself. I hated every single second of the excruciating boredom of being forced to sit down and shut up for 8 hours a day. The US education system is fucking garbage.

rob_c 5y ago

Did they attempt to take the analysis back in time to use the larger dataset of schools being closed. I.e. Has teen suicide in America always been higher when schools were open always, or is this somehow unique to the extra closures?

loeg 5y ago
> That’s not unexpected. Suicide death rates (for which we have decades of reliable data) among teens and young adults predictably fall during summer months, and also in December—that is, times when schools are the least in session. So, what our graphs above show, an apparent inverse correlation between school closings and suicidal behavior, is not unique to the Covid-19 pandemic.
- rob_c 5y ago
  Thanks! Ah hadn't noticed that and was struggling to paste the info graphic. Would love to see the decorrolation displayed graphically but that's just the way I read data

vmception 5y ago

> Regardless, no one would argue that we should do away with in-person learning just because more time spent in the classroom appears to be associated with increased rates of attempted or completed suicide. But it is an upsetting insight, nonetheless. This suggests that the predisposed or susceptible population is weeded out by adulthood, yes? Seems like a good enough reason to keep the status quo, while others continue research about the actual reason, assuming there is consensus on decreasing it.

idanman 5y ago

This reminds me of the documentary Race to Nowhere. They talk about the high suicide rate amongst teens due to burn out from school and how some were brought back from the brink. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_to_Nowhere https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_to_Nowhere

techlaw 5y ago

Could not access the article but it appears to reference this CDC MMWR from June 18, 2021: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7024e1-H.pdf https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7024e1-H.pdf [I've included the link to the CDC report above and the summary below because this information is important and should be accessible (i.e. should not require allowing fbcdn.net trackers). I also prefer the source to somebody's interpretation. If the original article provides additional insight I'd like to see a non-FB link to it, my admittedly quick scan of the comments did not spot one.] From the SUMMARY of that report: What is already known about this topic? During 2020, the proportion of mental health–related emergency department (ED) visits among adolescents aged 12–17 years increased 31% compared with that during 2019. What is added by this report? In May 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, ED visits for suspected suicide attempts began to increase among adolescents aged 12–17 years, especially girls. During February 21–March 20, 2021, suspected suicide attempt ED visits were 50.6% higher among girls aged 12–17 years than during the same period in 2019; among boys aged 12–17 years, suspected suicide attempt ED visits increased 3.7%. What are the implications for public health practice? Suicide prevention requires a comprehensive approach that is adapted during times of infrastructure disruption, involves multisectoral partnerships and implements evidence-based strategies to address the range of factors influencing suicide risk.

I_cape_runts 5y ago

Oof

Animats 5y ago

"When schools closed, suspected suicide attempts actually decreased. When schools reopened, suspected suicide attempts skyrocketed in lockstep." From the way the data is presented, it's not clear that there was a net change either way. Maybe this just concentrated suicides around school reopening times.

aaron695 5y ago

This is exactly as expected? I don't understand? They have lost resilience and are back under stress again. We damaged them, now we'll see the results. Exactly to narrative. Is the article something about girls and not boys? Boys will take a little longer before we see any jump if it's as expected. The death of a child can have less immediate stress than a overseas beach holiday. Are we confusing emotions that are not stress, like grief or loneliness or boredom

kaminar 5y ago

Once again proof that men are more successful.

ineedasername 5y ago

The number of reported suicide attempts decreased during school closures. That might mean actual attempts decreased too, but it could also be another piece of fallout from people deferring treatment because they or their families didn't want exposure to COVID. Or mental health services were over burdened by increased issues from other areas of the population. Or it really was going back to a school environment that is often socially toxic. Or some combination of these and other factors.

qwerty456127 5y ago
To me it seems school environment always is extremely toxic. Probably the most toxic thing I can imagine. Perhaps prisons are worse but I'm not sure.

jokethrowaway 5y ago

While I believe schools to be terrible (great for seeing, meeting people; terrible for the forced curriculum down your throat part), I disagree with the author's reading (even if correlation doesn't imply causation) that points at school being bad for kids. This could very well be the effect of a year of lockdown and having to go back in the real world. If that's the case, we'll see the number of suicides drop over the next years. Lockdowns caused me to fall into depression again but I never thought about killing myself. There was always hope that things would eventually go back to normal, you were . Now that the normal is back and I'm confronted with a reality which is partially worse than lockdown times (eg. having to go back to the office for employees, having to go to school instead of studying on zoom for students) I have a year of mental issues which I didn't fix, I'm burnt out, there is nothing else to wait for which will magically improve my life and I'm faced with the challenges of the pre-lockdown world. It doesn't surprise me to see suicides going up.

harleypig 5y ago

I have a personal knowledge of what comes from suicides and suicide attempts. It is something that needs to be addressed. I have issues with this article, as well as with the owner of the 'bulletin.com' domain. This article flips between discussing 'suicide attempts' and 'suicides' as if they are interchangeable, while only showing the data on 'suicide attempts'. This bothers me. "In fact, suicide attempts in adolescent girls dropped to rates similar to those seen in the summer of 2019. That’s not unexpected. Suicide death rates (for which we have decades of reliable data) among teens and young adults predictably fall during summer months, and also in December—that is, times when schools are the least in session." (emphasis mine) 'Suicide deaths' and 'suicide attempts' are not interchaneable.

xyzzy21 5y ago

Can you say "Social Media"?! The connection to anxiety, bullying and depression has already been demonstrated with adult women. It should be a surprise that young girls are worse affected. Men/boys mostly don't care about social attention and approval in ways that are amped up on Social Media. Yes we are different!