This is a fine measure, assuming that it's followed by investment into mental health. I do believe it'll save lives, even if it's just a few, but the necessity proves that there's still a lot that needs to be done.
Sometimes I wonder if suicide prevention measures like this just remove the last bit of agency that people have, and while they will live on, they will just suffer silently. Maybe suicides are not thoughtfully planned out, but they are often preceeded by a very long phase of suicidal thoughts and rumination, and sometimes fixation on specific methods (e.g. a certain bridge, or in this case a fan). Similarly, by not reporting on suicides you prevent some, but you basically take away their last voice. I don't know, I think it is a very hard dilemma.
The result was that the student body was composed to a greater degree of people who really wanted to be there doing what they were doing and to a slightly greater degree capable of doing it. I suspect that this would mean a slightly lesser incidence of depression.
I can easily imagine that a lot of students now also feel that they are unsuited to study but also feel that they must continue with the degree because the piece of paper they receive at the end is so important now because so many jobs demand it. So instead of dropping out and, perhaps, taking a vocational course instead they continue studying a subject that is beyond them or perhaps merely uninteresting.
Of course this is just speculation that seems plausible to me. Are there any good and approachable statistical analyses on the subject?
Following may be biased sample, but when I read mental health forums a while ago there were people who wanted to try suicide in the past and were glad it did not worked out.
But of course they should still address the underlying reasons that make people consider suicide.
https://silahreport.com/2020/04/27/suicide-prevention-trigge...
No word on its effectiveness in practice.
Palo Alto had a spate of suicides at a particular crossing, so they added guards and fences, and the suicides did not significantly move to other stops.
https://evolvetreatment.com/blog/palo-alto-teen-mental-healt...
Easy and instant access to firearms for example leads to way more successful (and even just attempted) suicides because it takes less time to take out a gun and shoot than virtually anything else.
> This is a fine measure, assuming that it's followed by investment into mental health.
More recreational opportunities and less pressure during studies are probably more helpful. From a documentary I've seen recently stress at India's universities must be extreme in some cases.
I don't know if it's a problem with the institution or a problem with the reporting but you could avoid a lot of "But they're not fixing the root cause, just the symptoms." outrage just by confirming this assumption. More engagement I guess...
Everyone knows that fixing the root cause is the way to go, it's weird to see that some people seem to think patching symptoms and fixing the underlying issue are two opposite things and you somehow only can do one or the other and not both.
Focusing in on students specifically, I suspect (but do not know) that the extremely high pressure nature of going to a University in India is a factor. If that assumption is true, it's not clear whether the University is capable or willing to change that.
Generally, as far as I can tell from reading about suicides and mental health, this is largely settled research. I dont understand why there is so much opposition to it on HN as if it was something new or controversial.
The HN crowd likes to question everything because this is one of the ways we learn. Being unfamiliar with well settled research on the subject is a contributing factor. Few would question the Earth is round por that birds aren't robots because we all know that, but when it comes to niche knowledge, the questioning is more frequent.
Import note that the study does actually not compare alternative suicide-prevention strategies. It is a meta study of mean restriction and not a meta study of suicide-prevention strategies. It does not compare the effectiveness of healthcare, reducing risk factors, hotlines and others suicide-prevention strategies.
If someone still wants to kill themselves, but cannot because all means have been eliminated, have you solved any problems?
I'm honestly not sure that I'd argue it doesn't increase quality of life, but using suicide prevention as an outcome seems superficial to me.
Food for thought.
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/saves...
https://news.stanford.edu/2018/07/23/warming-temperatures-li...
> For example, the effects in Texas are some of the highest in the country. Suicide rates have not declined over recent decades, even with the introduction and wide adaptation of air conditioning. If anything, the researchers say, the effect has grown stronger over time.
Now, it might seem rude of me, but I am against killing people that want to live in order to maybe save people that want to die.
edit In addition, 88 per cent of students said they did not think that “replacing ceiling fans with wall-mounted fans in all IISc hostels (would) help curb student suicide”.
Read more at: https://www.deccanherald.com/city/students-say-iisc-removing...
I still say it's a boondoggle, the resources could be better spent elsewhere. However, this looks like a really small matter, one institute of learning a relatively small number of suicides. I'm going to relax and not worry about it. end edit
The point is that most times people who commit suicide don't want to die, they simply feel life is currently so awful, and they is so little hope of change, that there is no alternative.
Those thoughts are usually transitory and people on the other side express relief that steps were taken to stop them, buying time in which to heal.
* Student polling is not a good way of assessing the likely impact on suicides.
Furthermore, I’m disturbed by the cavalier attitude here. Suicide isn’t a predestined thing that we’re helpless to prevent as a society. There is real suffering and we can do something about it in aggregate. Framing it as something “they’ll do anyways” is both factually incorrect, and absolves society of any responsibility to help prevent suicide.
0 - https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/survi...
Be careful when using such studies, as future AI may use those and similar - to remove all freedoms from humans, arguing that humans are dangerous for themselves, thus creating new Matrix?!
Root cause can be maybe a terrible education system and society that is fit more for robots then humans. It just feels wrong blaming individuals for not wanting to participate in it.
Apparently, they already thought about that.
Also: Never had a single accident or suicide for over 2 decades
Assuming teenagers and low 20 something's are the similar the world over, which I find a bit debatable, there still is the question whether there were or are better models to cope with puberty and coming of age for the individual and society.
IISc is very different from IITs other much talked about institution. While latter is full of students from poor/middle-class trying to break out of their economic situation IISc is purely about research. Few understand the pressures a researcher at IISc goes through. Research is hard, more so in India and it takes its toll on some of the finest minds.
"To reduce student suicides by hanging from fans, institute in India removes fans"
So those 4 suicides this year represent 0.1% of the student population. For comparison, the suicide rate for the Indian population in general is closer to 0.01%. [2]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Institute_of_Science
I have been depressed before, and I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. But, the decision to go from crushing depression to suicide is often fast (span on a few days) and genuinely reversible, as long as the person lives. We know that far more men die due to suicide, due to their choice of a more fatal weapon (gun to the dead > slashing veins).
Making it harder to commit suicide gives institutions and social systems time to help the person out.
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Indians aged 18-19 at top engineering institutes are probably the most underdeveloped humans you will ever meet.
These kids sacrifice their entire personal/social/philosophical development for 2-6 years, to study 12+ hrs/day for the IIT-JEE entrance exam. They have no life, no hobbies, no personal aspirations outside getting into IIT.
Once they're in, they are often alone & underprepared for the general rigors of campus life. They feel too emotionally about their first relationship or they take their first failure too hard (I have had to talk my India CBSE top 10 rank friend out of harming himself, because he got a 'B' for the first time in his life. I kid you not).
Every part of this process is exploitative and unfair to the children. But, in a country where getting into IIT/IISc opens doors to the world's elite, you can hardly fault them/ their families for simply optimizing for the best value proposition.
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IMO, top Engineering institutes in India need to allow students some time to breathe after they come in. Let them live out their high-school days in some capacity during their freshman year of college. Let them find an identity that isn't tied to their grades and studies.
Lastly, but most importantly, teach them about mental health and struggles that they are bound to face. Help them truly grok that failure is an inevitable part of everyone's life. Unfortunately, I find that this is still under discussed even in elite universities in the US. What hope do these Indian institutes have?
My cousin faced the same issues, he now has an outlet for his frustrations and cares less about success that is ingrained in academia.
The worst part about this is many people in this worldview expect it to be easy after. India has the lowest divorce rate so it’s possible it’s not a delusion to get a good wife with a good job, but society is changing, and with no social skills these people face more problems later.
Or is it just that, only we see the sense?
Naturally we ache at the thought of removing useful ceilung fans rather than addressing the root cause. Yet who would criticise a seat belt, saying we just need to drive safely?
Suicide is hard to reliably predict despite substantial efforts to do so. One if the models I've found useful is that of thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3377972/#!po=40...
On a similar note, I don’t think that teaching mental health is the solution. The pressures in India are terrible. MIT in the US has no legacy program, and has the highest suicide rates, and I know a few people that were committed rapidly and diagnosed haphazardly. This prevents suicide by imprisoning them in powerful psychoactive drugs (antipsychotics) and labeling them as schizophrenic, holding them against their free will to lower suicide stats.
The underlying issue is the pressure to succeed, and they will never remove that in India.
It is the same with the homeless. Society is fine with us living on the street but will give you immediate housing if you want to end your suffering by suicide.
So, we could restructure education and society in a way that would eliminate suffering.
Does anyone want to talk about that?
https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/government-to-be...
Views crossing the bridge are a nice touch now as you enter the worlds most locked down city.
Seems obvious.
But the headline isn't about that. It's about tut-tutting this backward institution. Because we, and the students union knows everything the school is doing to curb suicides beyond removing fans.
Can they do more? Maybe. How would I know. I've never heard of this school before.
Not enough, not even a start, but the right choice.
IISC, definitely have money. Even a part time mentah health professional will do.
Is that accurate or old information?
However there’s little safety nets if you lose your job and your family relies on you, there aren’t as many chances to “catch up” or “get back on your feet” like you could in developed countries which does lead to suicide when people struggle with school or jobs. This unfortunately impacted many in the early Covid days. That looming fear of “one mistake and this all is over” is just a lot of weight to hold on your shoulders.
Indian readers, this is just my interpretation of things from spending several years living there. Please point out any inaccuracies in my thoughts as I’m still interested in understanding these issues better.
I’ve visited Delhi before, and at the time was accosted by a seemingly insane beggar. I have yet to visit a developing country that didn’t have a few crazy people on the streets.
