ABSTRACT
Suicide and suicide attempt are clearly defined as subcategories of self-harm, but it is imprecise and misleading to refer to all self-harming behaviour as attempted suicide. This chapter utilizes the generic term prison to refer to all types of incarceration facility, referring to remand prisons, juvenile prisons and so on, when such specificity is necessary. The rate of suicide and other self-harm is higher amongst prisoners than among the general population, even when demographic factors are controlled for. The central psychological feature of all self-harm, regardless of degree of suicidal intent, is distress. Prisoners who self-harm are consistently found to display greater levels of psychological vulnerability to distress than do other prisoners, and a diminished capacity to cope with distress within the prison environment. According to Greg Dear's model, the critical aspect to preventing suicide and other self-harm in prison is to detect prisoners' distress at the point at which that distress arises.
