title: Clues to suicide, reconsidered.
abstract: This brief paper focuses on a rather recondite aspect of the suicidal scenario: dissembling (feigning, pretending, withholding). Most individuals who commit suicide exhibit prodromal indicia in the month before. These verbal and behavioral clues are found in about 90% of psychological autopsies of suicidal deaths. As for the other 10% who mask or hide their lethal intentions, we do well to assume that even some hidden clues might be deciphered by the skillful clinician or the alert friend or colleague.
authors.affiliation: University of California, Los Angeles, USA.
authors.forename: E S
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Shneidman
mesh_terms: D003674:Defense Mechanisms; D006801:Humans; D009042:Motivation; D010552:Personality Assessment; D012307:Risk Factors; D012919:Social Behavior; D013405:Suicide / Q000523:psychology*; D000092864:Suicide Prevention