Broken Home and Suicidal Behavior: Methodological Problems (IN: Current Issues of Suicidology, ed. by H J Moller, A Schmidtke & R Welz)

This article discusses the research which has found that a high proportion of patients with a record of suicidal behavior come from broken homes. The authors completed a survey of 69 studies published since 1941 in which broken homes among suicide vcitms range from 23% to 85%; however, they found numerous methodological concerns in most of the studies. The authors evaluate problems in defintions of a broken home, reasons for absences, reliability of subjects reports & other factors. (VM)