Observational studyCanadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie2024
Changes in Media Reporting Quality and Suicides Following National Media Engagement on Responsible Reporting of Suicide in Canada: Changements de la Qualité des reportages dans les médias sur les suicides suite à l'engagement des médias nationaux à la déclaration responsable du suicide au Canada.
Observational study in Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- Pooled it
- 'Fair and balanced?': quality of suicide-related reporting on major US cable news networks.The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science · 2025Article
- Investigating the impact of parallel media engagement initiatives on suicide reporting in Canada and Israel.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2025Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors at 8 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectiveResponsible media reporting is an accepted strategy for preventing suicide. In 2015, suicide prevention experts launched a media engagement initiative aimed at improving suicide-related reporting in Canada; its impact on media reporting quality and suicide deaths is unknown.
methodThis pre-post observational study examined changes in reporting characteristics in a random sample of suicide-related articles from major publications in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) media market. Articles (
resultsAcross-the-board improvement was observed in suicide-related reporting with substantial reductions in many elements of putatively harmful content and substantial increases in all aspects of putatively protective content. However, overarching article narratives remained potentially harmful with 55.2% of articles telling the story of someone's death and 20.8% presenting an other negative message. Only 3.6% of articles told a story of survival. After controlling for potential confounders, a nonsignificant numeric decrease in suicide counts was identified after initiative implementation (ω = -5.41,
conclusionsWe found evidence that a strategy to engage media in Canada changed the content of reporting, but there was only a nonsignificant trend towards fewer suicides. A more fundamental change in media narratives to focus on survival rather than death appears warranted.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.