Text Analysis of Suicide Risk in Adolescents and Young Adults.
Jia-Wen Guo, Julianne Kimmel, Lauri A Linder
PMID 35130778WHAT IT FOUND
Adolescents and young adults described suicide risk through pain, hopelessness, relationships and help seeking, and capacity to attempt.
They used slang and acronyms like KMS and KYS that may not look like suicide words.
Key findings
01The analysis examined 687 statements containing 9,647 words from 255 AYAs.
02The word clusters were grouped into three themes: pain or hopelessness, connectedness, and capacity to attempt suicide.
03AYAs used suicide-related slang and acronyms, including yeet, Kermit Sewage Slide, 2meirl4meirl, emo, FML, KMS, and KYS.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The sample was a convenience sample of AYAs from one region, so the words may not represent all AYAs. Most participants were White, non-Hispanic females, and the analysis did not compare responses by gender, race, or ethnicity. The study did not collect history of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, so it cannot represent people with known suicide experience. Some participants gave only individual words without context, so meaning was hard to confirm. The text analysis was not tested as a clinical screening method, and the authors noted clinicians may not have access to patients' social media posts.
Declared interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest. The article is listed as supported by NIH extramural and non-U.S. government research support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not treat these words as a validated screening tool or assume every use means active risk. The statements came from AYAs in a survey, not from patients being screened, and some terms can be casual or sarcastic.