This article presents a study of nurses’ and doctors’ perceptions of young people who engage in suicidal behaviour. A contemporary view of grounded theory is used to guide the collection and analysis of qualitative data from nurses and doctors working with young people in an accident and emergency department, paediatric medicine and child and adolescent mental health services (adolescent inpatient unit). The analysis of 45 semi-structured interviews generated the category: Processes of communication and associated meanings: Another voice, Complex messages and Seeing and using the social environment. A social semiotic framework is used to explore the way in which nurses and doctors perceive young people who engage in suicidal behaviour. The article concludes by considering the implications for policy and practice.
Aguilera, D. (1994). Crisis intervention: Theory and management. St Louis: Mosby .
2.
Aldridge, D. (1998). Suicide: The tragedy of hopelessness. London: Jessica Lingsley Publishers .
3.
Anderson, M. (1997). Nurses’ attitudes towards suicidal behaviour: A comparative study of community mental health nurses and nurses working in an accidents and emergency department . Journal of Advanced Nursing, 25, 1283-1291 .
4.
Apter, A. , Gothelf, D. , Orbach, I. , Weizman, R. , Ratzoni, G. , Har-Even, D. , & Tyano, S. (1995). Correlation of suicidal and violent behaviour in different diagnostic categories in hospitalised adolescent patients . Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 34(7), 912-918 .
5.
Babiker, G. , & Arnold, L. (1997). The language of injury: Comprehending self-mutilation. Leicester: British Psychological Society Books .
6.
Barthes, R. (1988). The semiotic challenge. New York: Hill & Wang .
7.
Bonnivier, J. (1996). Management of self-destructive behaviours in an open inpatient setting . Journal of Psychosocial Nursing, 34(2), 38-42 .
8.
Boyes, A. (1994). Repetition of overdose: A retrospective five year study . Journal of Advanced Nursing, 20(3), 462-468 .
9.
Burgess, S. , Hawton, K. , & Loveday, G. (1998). Adolescents who take overdoses: Outcome in terms of changes in psychopathology and the adolescents’ attitudes to care and to their overdose . Journal of Adolescence, 21, 209-218 .
10.
Burnard, P. (1991). A method of analysing interview transcripts in qualitative research . Nurse Education Today, 11, 461-466 .
11.
Burr, S. (1993). Adolescents and the ward environment . Paediatric Nursing, 5(1), 10-13 .
12.
Chamberlain, K. (1999). Using grounded theory in health psychology. In M. Murray & K. Chamberlain (Eds.), Qualitative health psychology: Theories and methods (ch. 12). London: Sage Publications .
13.
Chambers, I. (1986). Popular culture: The metropolitan experience. London: Methuen .
14.
Charmaz, K. (1995). Grounded theory (Part I: The search for meanings). In J. A. Smith , R. Harre , & L. V. Langenhove (Eds.), Rethinking methods in psychology (pp. 27-49). London: Sage Publications .
15.
Cohen, S. (1980). Folk devils and moral panics. London: Basil Blackwell .
16.
Collins, D. A. , & Kearns, R. A. (2001). Under curfew and under siege? Legal geographies of young people . Geoforum, 32, 389-403 .
17.
Cotterell, J. (1996). Social networks and social influences in adolescence. London: Routledge .
18.
Danesi, M. (1994). Cool: The signs and meaning of adolescence. Toronto: University of Toronto Press .
19.
Denzin, N. K. , & Lincoln, Y. S. (Eds.) (1998). The landscape of qualitative research: Theories and issues. California: Sage Publications .
20.
Department of Health (DoH) . (1999). National service framework for mental health. London: HMSO .
21.
Department of Health (DoH) . (2002). National suicide prevention strategy for England. London: HMSO .
22.
Domino, G. (1996). Test-retest reliability of the Suicide Opinion Questionnaire . Psychological Reports, 78, 1006-1010 .
23.
Downes, D. , & Rock, P. (1998). Understanding deviance: A guide to the sociology of crime and rule breaking, 3rd edn.Oxford: Oxford University Press .
24.
Eldrid, J. (1988). Caring for the suicidal. London: Constable .
25.
Fairbairn, G. (1995). Contemplating suicide: The language and ethics of self harm. London: Routledge .
Gerrard, N. (2002). Why are so many teenage girls cutting themselves?Observer, 19 May, p. 17 .
28.
Glaser, B. G. , & Strauss, A. L. (1967). The discovery of grounded theory. New York: Aldive .
29.
Goffman, E. (1959). Presentation of self in everyday life. London: Penguin .
30.
Golding, P. and Middleton, S. (1982). Images of Welfare. Oxford: Martin Robinson Publishers .
31.
Guiraud, P. (1975). Semiology. London: Routledge, Keegan & Paul .
32.
Hall, S. , & Jefferson, T. (1976). Resistance through rituals: Youth-subcultures in postwar Britain. London: Hutchinson Publishers .
33.
Harrington, R. C. , Kerfoot, M. , Dyer, E. , McNiven, F. , Gill, J. , Harrington, V. , & Woodham, A. (2000). Deliberate self-poisoning in adolescence: Why does a brief family intervention work in some cases and not in others?Journal of Adolescence, 23, 13-20 .
34.
Hawton, K. , Fagg, J. , Simkin, S. , Bale, E. , & Bond, A. (2000). Deliberate self-harm in adolescents in Oxford, 1985-1995 . Journal of Adolescence, 23(1), 47-55 .
35.
Hawton, K. , Marsack, P. , & Fagg, J. (1981). The attitudes of psychiatrists to deliberate self-poisoning: Comparison with physicians and nurses . British Journal of Medical Psychology, 54, 341-348 .
36.
Hawton, K. , Rodham, K. , Evans, E. , & Weatherall, E. (2002). Deliberate self-harm in adolescents: Self report survey in schools in England . British Medical Journal, 325, 1207-1211 .
37.
Hawton, K. , & van Heeringen, K. (Eds.) (2000). The international handbook of suicide and attempted suicide. London: John Wiley & Sons .
38.
Heiskala, R. (1999). From Goffman to semiotic sociology . Semiotica, 124(3/4), 211-234 .
39.
Henwood, K. L. , & Pidgeon, N. F. (1992). Qualitative research and psychological theorizing . British Journal of Psychology, 83, 97-111 .
40.
Hill, K. (1995). The long sleep: Young people and suicide. London: Virgo Press .
41.
Jenkins, R. , & Kovess, V. (2002). Evaluation of suicide prevention: A European approach . International Review of Psychiatry, 14, 34-41 .
42.
Lesko, N. (1996). In the ‘hood’: Music, appearance, attitude, and talk in teenagerhood . Semiotica, 112(3/4), 415-420 .
43.
Mathieson, C. M. (1999). Interviewing the ill and the healthy: Paradigm or process? In M. Murray & K. Chamberlain (Eds.), Qualitative health psychology: Theories and methods (ch. 8). London: Sage Publications .
44.
McGaughey, J. (1995). Suicide and parasuicide: A selected review of the literature . Journal of Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing, 2, 199-206 .
45.
McRobbie, A. (1994). The moral panic in the age of the postmodern mass media. In A. McRobbie (Ed.), Postmodernism and popular culture (pp. 198-219). London: Routledge .
46.
Olds, D. D. (1995). Semiotics for clinicians . Semiotica, 107(1/2), 89-103 .
47.
O’Sullivan, T. , Hartley, J. , Saunders, D. , & Fiske, J. (1983). Key concepts in communication. London: Methuen .
48.
Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative evaluation and research methods, 2nd edn.Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications .
49.
Paykel, E. (1994). Implications for training of health professionals. In R. Jenkins , S. Griffiths , I. Wylie , K. Hawton , G. Morgan , & A. Tylee (Eds.), The prevention of suicide (pp. 174-179). London: Department of Health, HMSO .
50.
Pfeffer, C. R. , Normandin, L. , & Kakuma, T. (1998). Suicidal children grow up: Relations between family psychopathology and adolescents’ lifetime suicidal behaviour . Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 186, 269-275 .
51.
Pierce, C. S. (1985 [1897]). Logic as semiotic: The theory of signs. In R. E. Innis (Ed.), Semiotics: An introductory anthology (pp. 1-23). Indiana: Indiana University Press .
52.
Pritchard, C. (1995). Suicide—the ultimate rejection? A psycho-social study. Buckingham: Open University Press .
53.
Rennie, D. L. (1998). Grounded theory methodology: The pressing need for a coherent logic of justification . Theory and Psychology, 8(1), 101-119 .
54.
Rioch, S. (1995). Suicidal children and adolescence: Crisis and preventive care. Durham: Celia Publications .
55.
Royal College of Psychiatrists . (1998). Managing deliberate self-harm in young people. Council Report (CR 64). London: Royal College of Psychiatrists .
56.
Saussure, F. (1974). Course in general linguistics. London: Fontana .
57.
Shucksmith, J. , & Hendry, L. (1998). Health issues and adolescents: Growing up, speaking out. London: Routledge .
58.
Simkin, S. , Hawton, K. , Whitehead, L. , Fagg, J. , & Eagle, M. (1995). Media influence on parasuicide: A study of the effects of a television drama portrayal of paracetemol self-poisoning . British Journal of Psychiatry, 167, 754-759 .
59.
Sless, D. (1986). In search of semiotics. London: Croom Helm .
60.
Strauss, A. L. (1987). Qualitative analysis for social scientists. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press .
61.
Strauss, A. L. , & Corbin, J. (1990). Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications .
62.
Talseth, A. , Lindseth, A. , Jacobsson, L. , & Norberg, A. (1999). The meaning of suicidal psychiatric in-patients’ experiences of being cared for by mental health nurses . Journal of Advanced Nursing, 29(5), 1034-1041 .
63.
World Health Organization (WHO) . (2000). Preventing suicide: A resource for general practitioners. Geneva: WHO .
64.
World Health Organization (WHO) . (2001). The world health report 2001—mental health: New understanding, new hope. Geneva: WHO .
