Estimating the Risk for Suicide Following the Suicide Deaths of 3 Asian Entertainment Celebrities: a Meta-Analytic Approach

This study aimed to estimate the risk for suicide after the suicide deaths of 3 entertainment celebrities in Asia during the first 4 weeks after the celebrity suicide & on a weekly basis. An ecological, retrospective time-series analysis & a meta-analysis of suicide deaths in Hong Kong (2001-2003), Taiwan & South Korea (both from 2003-2005), was conducted. The combined risks for suicide were found to be 1.43, 1.29, & 1.25 in the first, second, & third week respectively after the celebrity suicides while adjusting for secular trends, seasonality, economic situation, & temporal autocorrelation. The same-gender & same-method specific increases suggest that as people identify more with the celebrity, their risk for suicide rises. (42 refs.)