Canadian news media coverage of suicide during the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

Purpose The COVID-19 pandemic led to concerns about increases in suicidal behaviour. Research indicates that certain types of media coverage of suicide may help reduce suicidality (the Papageno effect), while other types may increase suicidality (the Werther effect). This study aimed to examine the tone and content of Canadian news articles about suicide during the first year of the pandemic. Methods Articles about suicide from Canadian news sources were collected and coded for adherence to responsible reporting of suicide guidelines. Articles which directly discussed suicidal behaviour in the COVID-19 context were identified and compared to other suicide articles in the same period. Lastly, a thematic analysis was conducted on the sub-sample of articles discussing suicide in the COVID-19 context. Results The sub-set of articles about suicide in the COVID-19 context ( n = 103) contained significantly more putatively helpful content compared to non-COVID-19 articles ( n = 457), such as including help information (56.3% Vs 23.6%), quoting an expert (68.0% Vs 16.8%) and educating about suicide (73.8% Vs 24.9%). This lower adherence among non-COVID-19 articles is concerning as they comprised over 80% of the sample. On the plus side, fewer than 10% of all articles provided monocausal, glamourized or sensational accounts of suicide. Qualitative analysis revealed the following three themes: (i) describing the epidemiology of suicidal behaviour; (ii) discussing self and communal care; and (iii) bringing attention to gaps in mental health care. Conclusion Media articles about suicide during the first year of the pandemic showed partial adherence to responsible reporting of suicide guidelines, with room for improvement.

Changes in Media Reporting Quality and Suicides Following National Media Engagement on Responsible Reporting of Suicide in Canada: Changements de la Qualité des reportages dans les médias sur les suicides suite à l’engagement des médias nationaux à la déclaration responsable du suicide au Canada

“…We found that, postimplementation, the national initiative was associated with substantial reductions in putatively harmful content and across-the-board increases in the proportion of articles with putatively protective content, a finding aligned with other recent Canadian research on media and suicide. [34][35][36] This finding differs somewhat from what we observed immediately after the release of the Mindset Guidelines and following the combined initiative onset. The release and dissemination of Mindset Guidelines coincided with some positive changes that appeared to persist over time (e.g., a greater proportion of articles presenting alternatives to suicide), but also negative changes that persisted for some years (e.g., a greater proportion of articles describing suicide methods in detail, presenting simplistic reasons for suicide).…”