Unemployment and the nature of suicide attempts.

The purpose of the study was to compare the perceptions of twenty unemployed and thirty employed British patients recovering from an attempted suicide as regards motives for self poisoning, intent to die, presence of warning, past history of attempts, history of psychiatric treatments, and types of problems reported as antecedents to the suicide attempt. Their key relatives/friends were also interviewed concerning their views of the emergency. Analysis of the responses failed to show significant differences between the employed and unemployed. The implications of these findings as regards further research is discussed.