Department of Social Welfare, Ewha Womans University, 52, Ewhayeodae-gil, Seodaemun-gu, Seoul, 03760, Republic of Korea.
BMC Public Health. 2018 Sep 12;18(1):1115. doi: 10.1186/s12889-018-6014-4.
With the dishonor of being the highest suicide rated country in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, South Korea should take more initiatives in suicide prevention. Although the role of the media and its relation to actual suicide attempts has been tested and supported by many studies, the suicide reporting guidelines are not well followed. The purpose of this study is to examine how well Korean newspapers adhere to existing guidelines and to suggest limitation and improvements for the current guidelines.
Five mainstream newspapers in South Korea, namely, Kyunghyang Shinmun, Hankyoreh, Chosun Ilbo, JoongAng Daily, and Dong-A Ilbo, were chosen for the analysis. Using the Naver news search engine, articles dated from January 1, 2014, to December 31, 2017, were selected with the keyword "suicide" and advanced option "printed newspaper." However, articles, columns, opinions, and reviews that utilized the word "suicide" in a general context were excluded from the final analysis. Finally, the number of cases was narrowed down to 368. Each article was analyzed using the guideline framework consisting of 13 items: sensational coverage, overstatement, direct wording, method used, details about site/location, photographs, suicide note, generalization, speculation, romanticization, interviews with the bereaved, help-seeking information, and public education.
More than 60% of the articles included direct wording (63.9%), mentioned the method used (68.2%), and provided details about the site or location (74.5%). Nearly half of the articles revealed the contents of the suicide note (44.6%). Less than 3% of the suicide reports had information about hotline logo or phone numbers (1.4%) and facts regarding suicide and suicide prevention (2.2%).
Our study revealed that the guidelines were ineffective in their monitoring role and that most of the newspapers were incompliant with many significant guideline items in South Korea. Our findings not only explore the limitations of the current guidelines but also provide an important rationale as to why there should be stronger suicide monitoring regulation or an agency with sufficient authority to prevent suicide in a nation-wide scale.
韩国是经合组织中自杀率最高的国家，蒙此耻辱，应在预防自杀方面采取更多措施。尽管媒体的作用及其与实际自杀企图的关系已被许多研究证实和支持，但自杀报道指南并未得到很好的遵守。本研究旨在检查韩国报纸遵守现有指南的情况，并为当前指南提出限制和改进建议。
选择了韩国的五家主流报纸，即《朝鲜日报》、《韩民族》、《朝鲜日报》、《中央日报》和《东亚日报》。使用 Naver 新闻搜索引擎，选择 2014 年 1 月 1 日至 2017 年 12 月 31 日的文章，关键词为“自杀”，并使用高级选项“印刷报纸”。然而，文章、专栏、意见和评论中那些在一般语境中使用“自杀”一词的文章被排除在最终分析之外。最后，将案例数量缩小到 368 个。使用由 13 个项目组成的指南框架分析每篇文章：耸人听闻的报道、夸大其词、直接措辞、使用的方法、地点/位置的详细信息、照片、自杀遗言、概括、猜测、浪漫化、对遗属的采访、寻求帮助的信息和公众教育。
超过 60%的文章包含直接措辞（63.9%），提到使用的方法（68.2%），并提供地点/位置的详细信息（74.5%）。近一半的文章揭示了自杀遗言的内容（44.6%）。不到 3%的自杀报告包含热线标志或电话号码的信息（1.4%）和关于自杀和自杀预防的事实（2.2%）。
我们的研究表明，这些指南在监测方面没有发挥作用，大多数报纸都没有遵守韩国许多重要的指南项目。我们的发现不仅探讨了当前指南的局限性，还为为什么需要在全国范围内建立一个具有足够权威的更强有力的自杀监测监管机构或机构提供了重要的理由，以防止自杀。
