This paper reviews the burgeoning sociological literature on non-suicidal self-injury, in which individuals intentionally harm themselves by cutting, burning, scratching, or smashing their body parts. We identify challenges to studying self-injury, such as conf licting definitions and categorizations. Comparing self-injury to other behaviors such as suicide, body modification, and self-mutilation, we assert that non-suicidal self-injury deserves its own conceptual category. We explain how a critical sociological approach provides a valuable counterweight to medical and psychological studies of self-injury. In particular, this paper advances the deviance perspective. Finally, we highlight how technology has allowed self-injurers to build supportive communities in cyberspace, blurring the line between hidden and public acts. We conclude with suggestions for future directions in the study of self-injury.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract