ABSTRACT
Suicide is the resulting act of an individual decision at a moment in time. There are, however, many influences and commonalities around the personal decision to kill oneself. This chapter describes some of the global, societal, and criminological aspects as well as a discussion of the psychological and psychiatric factors of this individual tragedy. The complexity of the interaction of societal and personal factors is difficult to quantify or describe. There is an acknowledgement that, despite the broad range of research and mass of knowledge, there remains no accurate assessment of immediate risk. It is extremely difficult to distinguish which person in a population will commit suicide, particularly among other distressed, vulnerable individuals. Similarly difficult to quantify, though not covered in this chapter, are the means by which many suicides are averted. Suicide remains an unresolved tragedy for all involved.
