Attitudes of Social Workers about Rational Suicide

Abstract

Suicide is a major public health concern. It is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States. Social workers serve as the largest group of mental health care providers, and commonly intervene with suicidal clients. Despite the high rate of suicide and social workers interface with client suicidality, there is no research on the attitudes of social workers toward rational suicide. The notion of rational suicide challenges traditional views on suicide intervention and has complex ethical implications for the social work profession. Social workers adhere to the ethical standards set forth by the NASW and rational suicide involves two of those ethical standards, client self-determination and commitment to clients. This quantitative research study examined the attitudes of 2,157 licensed clinical social workers toward rational suicide. Findings revealed that social workers broadly agree (67.1%) that individuals can make a rational decision to die by suicide. Social workers’ personal characteristics (gender, age, race/ethnicity, state residency, religious affiliation and having personal thoughts of suicide) were found to predict their attitudes about rational suicide. The findings suggest that social workers’ attitudes about rational suicide are related to their personal characteristics. These findings have ethical considerations for the social work profession when intervening with suicidal persons with physical and psychological pain as well as value neutral practice. Keywords: Rational suicide, ethics, clinical social work, physical, psychological pain