CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 1,919Suicide and Self-Harm StudiesDeath Anxiety and Social ExclusionPsychological Treatments and Disorders

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 210 of the 212 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.

Suicide as escape from self.

Baumeister, Roy F.·1990·Psychological Review
DOI 10.1037/0033-295x.97.1.90
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Suicide is analyzed in terms of motivations to escape from aversive self-awareness. The causal chain begins with events that fall severely short of standards and expectations. These failures are attributed internally, which makes self-awareness painful. Awareness of the self's inadequacies generates negative affect, and the individual therefore desires to escape from self-awareness and the associated affect. The person tries to achieve a state of cognitive deconstruction (constricted temporal focus, concrete thinking, immediate or proximal goals, cognitive rigidity, and rejection of meaning), which helps prevent meaningful self-awareness and emotion. The deconstructed state brings irrationality and disinhibition, making drastic measures seem acceptable. Suicide can be seen as an ultimate step in the effort to escape from self and world.

Overview

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1037/0033-295x.97.1.90

Cites

210 of 210 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Verification

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Citations

Cites

Cited by

Sorted by citations

  • The need to belong: Desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation.

    Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1995) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037//0033-2909.117.3.497 · Cited by 23,245

    “Indeed, the main criticism that can be leveled against Durkheim's hypothesis is that it is incomplete in the sense that it does not explain everything about suicide (e.g., Baumeister, 1990; Douglas, 1967), but it is correct as far as it goes.”
    BackgroundSelf-citation

  • The interpersonal theory of suicide.

    Van Orden, K. A., Witte, T. K., Cukrowicz, K. C., Braithwaite, S. R., Selby, E. A., & Joiner, T. E. (2010) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/a0018697 · Cited by 5,292

    “However, the interpersonal theory diverges from previous theories in its proposal that an unmet “need to belong” (Baumeister & Leary, 1995, p. 1) is the specific interpersonal need involved in desire for suicide. The theory also differs in that we propose that thwarted belongingness is a multidimensional construct. Fi…”
    BackgroundInfluential

  • Risk factors for suicidal thoughts and behaviors: A meta-analysis of 50 years of research

    Franklin, J. C., Ribeiro, J. D., Fox, K. R., Bentley, K. H., Kleiman, E. M., Huang, X., Musacchio, K. M., Jaroszewski, A. C., Chang, B. P., & Nock, M. K. (2017) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/bul0000084 · Cited by 3,784

    “1136/jech-2011200464 Baumeister, R. F. (1990). Suicide as escape from self. Psychological Review, 97, 90–113. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.97.1.90 Baumert, J., Schneider, B., Lukaschek, K., Emeny, R. T., Meisinger, C., Erazo, N., . . . Ladwig, K. H. (2014). Adverse conditions at the workplace are associated wit…”
    BackgroundInfluential

  • Suicide and suicidal behavior

    Nock, M. K., Borges, G., Bromet, E. J., Cha, C. B., Kessler, R. C., & Lee, S. (2008) · Epidemiologic Reviews · doi:10.1093/epirev/mxn002 · Cited by 2,897

    “Several such risk factors include the presence of hopelessness (83–85), anhedonia (49,86), impulsiveness (70,87–89), and high emotional reactivity (86,87,90), each of which may increase psychological distress to a point that is unbearable and lead a person to seek escape via suicide (88,91–93).”
    Background

  • Experiential avoidance and behavioral disorders: A functional dimensional approach to diagnosis and treatment.

    Hayes, S. C., Wilson, K. G., Gifford, E. V., Follette, V. M., & Strosahl, K. (1996) · Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1037//0022-006x.64.6.1152 · Cited by 3,595

    “When the motivational conditions involved in suicide are analyzed, more than half of actual or attempted suicides involve an attempt to flee from aversive events (Loo, 1986; Smith & Bloom, 1985), especially states of mind such as guilt and anxiety (Bancroft, Skrimshire & Simkins, 1976; Baumeister, 1990).”
    Background

See all 1,919

Related

See all

Metadata

Authors
Baumeister, R. F.
Affiliations
Case Western Reserve University (US)
Corresponding author
Baumeister, Roy F.
ORCID
Baumeister, Roy F.
Venue
Psychological Review
Publisher
American Psychological Association (APA)
Published
1990
Volume
97
Issue
1
Pages
90-113
ISSN
  • 0033-295X (ISSN-L)
  • 1939-1471
DOI
10.1037/0033-295x.97.1.90
OpenAlex
W2098559214
Cited by
1,919
References
212
Citations by year
2026: 91 · 2025: 137 · 2024: 129 · 2023: 116 · 2022: 100 · 2021: 88 · 2020: 105 · 2019: 88 · 2018: 89 · 2017: 95 · 2016: 78 · 2015: 92 · 2014: 85 · 2013: 81 · 2012: 67
FWCI
13.21
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Psychological Review (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Suicide and Self-Harm Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Psychological Treatments and Disorders
Keywords
suicide, self-awareness, negative affect, internal attribution, self-justification, disinhibition, irrationality, meaning, temporal focus, concrete thinking, cognitive rigidity
MeSH terms
Depressive Disorder, Escape Reaction, Humans, Self Concept, Suicide, Suicide, Attempted

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review