ADOLESCENTS WHO ATTEMPT SUICIDE: PRELIMINARY FINDINGS

"Precipitating causes" can only be meaningfully evaluated within the context of the individual's total biography and from the perspective of what these situations have meant to him. The process whereby the adolescent comes to view suicide as the "only solution" is seen to result from a progression of his problems through three stages: 1) a long-standing history of problems; 2) a period of "escalation" of problems by the introduction of new problems associated with adolescence within the last five years; and 3) a final stage—a recent onslaught of problems usually characterized by a chain-reaction dissolution of any remaining meaningful social relationships. This progressive social isolation constitutes "the problem" and at the same time serves to prevent the adolescent from securing any possible means of resolving it.