Comparison of journals of suicidology: a bibliometric study from 2006–2010.
BACKGROUND
Three English-language journals deal explicitly with suicide phenomena. To the best of our knowledge, no previous study has analyzed the subject content of these three journals.


OBJECTIVE
To review the abstracts of the three suicide-related journals in order to clarify the subjects of the papers.


METHODS
We examined all abstracts of every paper published in Crisis: The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention, Archives of Suicide Research, and Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior for the 5 years between 2006 and 2010, and categorized each paper by subject.


RESULTS
We found that the journals were similar with respect to subject allocation. Most papers dealt with epidemiological issues (32.7-40.1% of abstracts); prevention (5.8%-15.3%) and research (8.3%-10.6%) were next best represented subjects. Clinical papers comprised from 2.8% to 8.2% of the studies published.


CONCLUSIONS
English-language suicide journals publish a preponderance of epidemiological studies. Clinical studies are relatively underrepresented.
Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MA, USA. mark_goldblatt@hms.harvard.edu
Mark J
MJ
Goldblatt
Mark
M
Schechter
John T
JT
Maltsberger
Elsa
E
Ronningstam
D015706:Bibliometrics; D016021:Epidemiologic Studies; D006801:Humans; D011643:Publishing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D013405:Suicide / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D000092864:Suicide Prevention