Oxford Handbook of Suicide and Self-Injury

Suicide is a perplexing human behavior that remains among the leading causes of death worldwide, responsible for more deaths each year than all wars, genocide, and homicide combined. Although suicide and other forms of self-injury have baffled scholars and clinicians for thousands of years, the past few decades have brought significant leaps in our understanding of these behaviors. This volume provides a comprehensive summary of the most important and exciting advances in our understanding of suicide and self-injury and our ability to predict and prevent it. Comprised of a formidable who's who in the field, the handbook covers the full spectrum of topics in suicide and self-injury across the lifespan, including the classification of different self-injurious behaviors, epidemiology, assessment techniques, and intervention. Chapters probe relevant issues in our societysurrounding suicide, including assisted suicide and euthanasia, suicide terrorism, overlap between suicidal behavior and interpersonal violence, ethical considerations for suicide researchers, and current knowledge on survivors of suicide. The most comprehensive handbook on suicide and self-injury to date, this volume is a must-read text for graduate students, fellows, academic and research psychologists, and other researchers working in the brain and behavioral sciences.

There is no doubt that this book will likely appeal to a wide range of mental health researchers and practitioners, including psychologists, social workers, policy makers, and psychiatrists. Students in psychology and psychiatry will find this resource helpful in their coursework as they developed their skills as a clinician. Seasoned therapists, physicians, and researchers will aslo benefit from a deepened understanding of the important concepts covered in this book., The Oxford Handbook of Suicide and Self-Injury can provide clinicians with greater understanding of the issues for assessment and treatment. It also provides the reader the opportunity to be well informed for the coming dialogues about suicide and NSSI.

Matthew K. Nock, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychology and Director of the Laboratory for Clinical and Developmental Research in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University.