Netflix at the end of March 2017, the first season of the series “the Dead girl was lying” online, one well known to psychologists. They unanimously warned of “13 Reasons Why”, the original title of the production, which tells of the suicide of a high school student. The experts feared imitation of actions. The creators responded by explaining their work to the important contribution to the discussion. Actress Kate Walsh, who plays in the series, the mother of the dead girl, even called for, to make the series in schools.
now, However, studies suggest that the warnings were in no way inappropriate. Researchers at the Ohio State University College of Medicine have observed in connection with the series a phenomenon that is referred to as the “Werther effect” – named after Goethe’s novel “The sorrows of young Werther”, whose publication should have led to a wave of suicides of young people.
During this famous historical phenomenon hardly, there are countless studies to the effect in the modern time. You all arrive at the same result: The major reports on the theme of suicide because, for example, a Celebrity life has taken, increases the rate of suicide. Still stronger is the effect, if the place and the method to be called or to appear self-killing is legitimate.
10 were mainly Affected – to 17-year-old boy
“Dead girls don’t lie” is just that: The series is set after the death of the student. She left her classmates even intermittent, audio-cassettes – confession and indictment in radio play form. On 13 cassette pages in 13 series follow reports of bullying and sexual violence. The English title “13 Reasons Why” will designate all of this as a reason for your suicide, which is then presented as a dramatic climax of a picture explicitly. For psychologists this is a No-go.
the results of The research confirm your concern. In April 2017, i.e. the month after the publication of the series, rose, the suicide rate in the United States by 28.9 percent to the highest level in five years. Until the end of the year 195 more people took life, as the researchers had predicted on the basis of historical data. Especially affected was the group of 10 – to 17-Year-olds, so Teenagers as the protagonists of the series; the Elderly were not affected.
Contrary to the assumption of the researchers, the Rate rose, however, especially among the young, although in the series a girl takes life. They explain that girls to suicide attempts, although more and more companies, this but less often fatal and is therefore not in the statistics.
in Switzerland, dozens of young people in the clinics were, because they had been brought by the series of thoughts of suicide. This was a few months ago public. Gabriele Pauli, Head of child and adolescent psychiatry at the University of Zurich, speaking at the time to “10 before 10” of the “hair-raising cases”. A girl said that she had never felt so well understood as as a spectator of the series; immediately after that, she tried to take his own life.
The results in the United States is also confirmed by Thomas niederk red Thaler, of the group’s suicide directs research at the Medical University of Vienna. At the end of may he wants to publish his own study on the subject. These come with a different method, in principle, to the same result: a significant increase in teenage suicides in the United States after the publication of the series. Unlike the American colleagues, he can, however, observe a significant increase in the suicide rate in girls.
Causal relationship is not provable, but likely to be
The hypothesis: Mentally impaired Teenagers imitate what they see on Netflix. Thomas niederk red Thaler criticized in this context, the nature of the narrative: “Most problematic is that all of the possible problems that young people are linked in the series necessarily with the suicide. The help will seek it.” Also the adults do not want to help in the series of the suicidal girl or are not able to do so. In the worst case, could arise in the case of young people the impression that there was for you in real life no help in case of problems – with the fatal result that you are looking for in the first place to help you might find.
the authors of The American study avoid the debt question, however, because they are not able to clarify these doubts. You don’t ask for the individual reasons for the suicides, but only the statistical increase as a result of the Netflix series. However, the question of responsibility for the 195 additional suicides comes to mind. “We can’t prove that the deaths are related causally to the series,” says niederk red Thaler: “But the probability is very high that you are in a connection. The should Netflix be thoughtful.” (Editorial Tamedia)
Created: 09.05.2019, 14:29 PM
