Thinking and Doing Prevention: A Critical Analysis of Contemporary Youth Crime and Suicide Prevention Discourses

Abstract

In this article, we have traced some of the dominant cultural narratives shaping current understandings of youth crime and suicide. We have aimed to show some of the ways that our received understandings of what the problem is and what should be done about it are social constructions that privilege a certain kind of scientific explanation. By starting from the premise that narrow, highly regulated approaches to studying these complex problems are bound to be inadequate we have argued that alternative ways of thinking, studying and doing prevention need to be considered. A number of theoretical frameworks, including constructionist, critical, and postmodern paradigms, have been identified as having a useful contribution to make. We conclude by recommending ways of thinking and doing prevention that capitalize on young people's wisdom, recognize more collaborative approaches to knowledge-making and community building, and enable multiple forms of critical engagement and resistance as well as engendering practices of hope and solidarity.

Suicide in children: Concept analysis using Rodgers's evolutionary approach

“…The emergence of new paradigms, such as the constructivist and participatory paradigms, shapes the methodologies used by researchers to produce knowledge (Lincoln & Guba, 2018), and, thus, the concept of “suicide in children” is conceptualized according to the theoretical background of the researcher. For example, from a constructivist perspective, children and adolescents’ suicide are understood as an “unstable, historically contingent and unruly problem – cannot be solved, nor contained through an exclusive reliance on pre‐determined, universal or standardized intervention” (White & Stoneman, 2012, p. 42). This statement highlights the possible limitations of a postpositivist epistemology (Lincoln & Guba, 2018) to understand suicide in children.…”

“…In fact, many researchers from the medical field propose to conduct studies involving smaller groups based on age to construct suicide assessment tools for children and adolescents (Horowitz et al, 2014). It is possible that the use of these methodologies from the biomedical framework may possibly lead to premature closure about what can be known (White & Stoneman, 2012). It may also produce decontextualized interventions through “standardized youth suicide prevention programs” characterized by a “one‐size‐fits‐all quality,” even if categorized by age (White, 2014, p. 100).…”

“…The early influence of quantitative studies from psychology, sociology, and medicine has forged this concept as psychopathology that could be explained with risk factors (Soole et al, 2015). While suicide in children was widely explained as a biomedical problem by a significant proportion of health professionals for the last 20 years (Soole et al, 2015), others conceptualized it as a political and/or a social problem (White & Stoneman, 2012). These differences may be caused by paradigmatic shifts, as well as the development of new theories (Rodgers, 2005).…”

“…Another group of researchers (Nnam et al, 2018), influenced by a critical theory paradigm (Lincoln & Guba, 2018), stated that suicide in children “means different things to different people, varies from society, changes from time to time, and is influenced by a country's legal dynamics, crime patterns, and trends and security situation” (p. 38). From a constructionist perspective, White and Stoneman (2012) suggested that “youth suicide might be more fruitfully understood as a wicked and unruly (wild) problem that is associated with high levels of instability, uncertainty, unpredictability and complexity” (p. 42).…”

El construccionismo social en la conducta suicida: conversaciones narrativas con estudiantes universitarios

“…Con este propósito se emplearon técnicas narrativas que orientaron la conversación hacia relatos generativos de identidad, entre ellas, el árbol de la vida, los documentos terapéuticos, el equipo de la vida y la ceremonia de definición (Denborough, 2014;White, 1995;White y Epston, 1980/1993. La aplicación de técnicas narrativas para la investigación social en temas relacionados con el suicidio ha sido registrada en diversos estudios (Crestuzzo, 2018;Michel et al, 2017;Núñez et al, 2018;Ramírez, 2014;White & Stoneman, 2012).…”