Overview: Special Issue on Advancing Understanding of the Causes of and Treatment for Suicidal Behavior

Abstract

In this overview, I consider the gregariousness of human nature and use it as context for the five articles in this special issue on suicidality. I point out that these five papers represent the diversity in concepts and methods characteristic of a young science, decades away from maturity. Nevertheless, I contend that there are commonalities in suicidality specifically and human experience more generally, and that themes like human sociality may serve as a heuristic in understanding them and in preventing the deaths by suicide.