Citation

Beam RA, John SL, Yaqub MM. Journal. Stud. 2018; 19(10): 1447-1465.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/1461670X.2017.1279563

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Unlike many other unnatural deaths, suicides are occurrences that journalists often hesitate to cover. "Our policy is not to write about suicides," many journalists say. Except that often they do. This article, based on interviews with 50 US journalists, examines the rationales that journalists invoke as they decide whether to cover a suicide. This can be a high-risk decision because of the potential for suicide contagion and copycat effects. We conclude that in making a decision to cover a suicide, journalists go through a process of routinizing what, at the outset, they had considered an exceptional situation. This routinization provides a means to rationalize covering a death that they often say they would prefer to ignore. © 2017, © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Language: en

Keywords

suicide; news values; contagion; journalists; newsworthy; routinization