Durkheims Durkheim s Study of Suicide Le Suicide 1896

Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) (1858 1917)

Widely Wid l regarded d d as a POSITIVIST Some aspects of Durkheims work will be used to illustrate the positivist approach This classic study is seen as a model of positivist research and methodology REMEMBER Positivism?! This is the view that sociology should be studied scientifically in the same way as the natural sciences Hypothetico-deductive method?!! (cause and effect relationships)

Why Suicide?
1. Sociology in late 19th Century was becoming established and Durkheim wanted to show how his approach was superior to others 2 Thus showing that sociology can explain 2. things in a way in which no other discipline could ld E.g. psychological explanations

Why Suicide?
3. According to Durkheim, suicide can occur for personal reasons, but it cannot account for the p suicide rate 4 Availability of suicide statistics from Europe (to 4. be seen as rigorous as other sciences) 5. To show cause and effect relationships

Durkheims Durkheim s aims

Action is shaped by society Sociology must be more than speculation (it must support its claims with evidence e.g. statistics) Sociological theories must go beneath the surface of phenomena and find hidden underlying causes of behaviour

Types of suicide
Determined by relationships between individuals y and society Main Pattern S i id rates are d Suicide dependant d upon the h d degree to which individuals were integrated into society and the degree to which society regulates individual behaviour

Types of suicide
1. Altruistic - Excess/integration 2. Anomic - Insufficient regulation 3. Egoistic insufficient integration 4. Fatalistic excess regulation

Egoistic Suicide
Individual being insufficiently integrated into groups p and society y the social g E.g. explains difference in suicide rates of Protestants and Roman Catholics (Catholics more strongly integrated) Unmarried and childless less integrated, therefore higher suicide rate

Anomic Suicide
Took place when society did not regulate y individuals sufficiently Where norms and values are disrupted by rapid social change leading to uncertainty /guidelines for behaviour increasingly unclear Anomic suicide increases during times of economic depression/boom/bust

Altruistic (pre-industrial (pre industrial society)

Individual so well integrated into society that y sacrifice their own life out of a sense of they duty to others E.g. E g Hindu Hindu's s kill themselves at their husbands funerals

Fatalistic suicide (pre-industrial) (pre industrial)

When society restricts the individual too much Durkheim thought this type was less important in modern society But B historically hi i ll i interesting, i e.g. hi high h suicide i id rates among slaves

Response to the 4 types

The balance of these 4 types of suicide create a suicide rate In modern society there are 2 major forms of suicide 1. Increasing detachment from others (leading to egoistical suicide) 2 Dissatisfaction in relation to expectations 2. (leading to anomic suicide)

In conclusion conclusion
Durkheim accepted that there may be an placed in occasional suicide which could not be p any category Generally suicide has some relationship with social rules or values and the individual The causes of suicide are not individual Suicide is structural in origin