The reporting of suicide and trespass incidents by online media in the United States.

Technical reportPDFTech ReportDOT/FRA/ORD-17/02RR04AA/PA155SuicideTrespassersNewsRecommendationsFatalitiesRailroadsUnited StatesUnited States. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Research and DevelopmentGabree, Scott H.Mejia, BiankaJohn A. Volpe National Transportation Systems Center (U.S.)United States. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Railroad Policy and DevelopmentUnited States. Federal Railroad Administration. Office of Research, Development, and TechnologyAGR-SAFETY AND SECURITY-SAFETY AND SECURITYNTL-RAIL TRANSPORTATION-RAIL TRANSPORTATIONNTL-RAIL TRANSPORTATION-Rail SafetyNTL-SAFETY AND SECURITY-Human FactorsNTL-SAFETY AND SECURITY-Rail SafetyNTL-SAFETY AND SECURITY-SAFETY AND SECURITYVolpe National Transportation Systems Center, Technical Reference CenterThe reporting of a suicide death in the media has the potential to increase imitative suicide attempts for vulnerable individualswho read the article, a phenomenon known as suicide contagion or the \ue2\u20ac\u153Werther effect.\ue2\u20ac? Organizations around the world havedeveloped recommendations for how to responsibly report on suicide incidents in a way less likely to result in contagion. For thisresearch, 1,173 articles on FRA-reported suicide and trespass incidents were collected and analyzed for content. While mediaoutlets often followed many of the suicide reporting recommendations, none were consistently followed in every article analyzedand a few key recommendations were often never applied. For example, the term \ue2\u20ac\u153suicide\ue2\u20ac? was often included in the title ofarticles, details about the location where the suicide took place and the actions preceding impact were often provided, while helpseekinginformation was only rarely included. In general, railway suicide incidents tended to be reported in a similar way totrespass incidents, rather than as a suicide by another means. The development of railway-specific recommendations could help toencourage responsible reporting practices regarding railway trespass and suicide incidents