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597272
research-article2015
GCTXXX10.1177/1076217515597272Gifted Child TodayGifted Child Today
GIFTED CHILD TODAY
vol. 39 ■ no. 1
Columns
Social and Emotional Development of
Gifted Students
The Role of Contagion in Suicidal Behavior Among Students With Gifts and Talents
Tracy L. Cross, PhD1
Keywords: at-risk students, social/emotional needs, gifted
education
O
ver the past year or so, two reputable universities and
public schools experienced multiple suicides. The
Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT), The
College of William and Mary (W&M), two high schools in Palo
Alto California, and one high School in Northern Virginia have
faced the deaths of several of their students. I am including this
particular list of schools as they are well known for having
extraordinarily strong student populations, academically
speaking, and because they are well known within the gifted
education community. In the cases of MIT and W&M, only the
top 5% to 10% of the high-achieving students who apply get
admitted. For those of us who work on behalf of very highachieving students, these schools have longstanding histories of
cultures of extraordinary performance among their students.
I should be clear that I have not studied the specific suicides
of the students from these schools at this time. This column is
to offer a perspective on suicidal behavior among gifted
students that moves away from a wholly psychological
perspective to more of a community-based perspective. This
model does not undervalue the role of the field of psychology
in explaining suicidal behavior, but speaks instead to the
importance of the salient influences of culture, context, and
community on suicidal behavior among this group. In this
column, I will discuss one specific aspect of this suicidal
phenomenon: contagion.
The Meaning of Suicide
On the surface, suicide seems easy to define (e.g., the act of
killing oneself) and understand; it seems timeless and not
culturally specific. However, under closer scrutiny, we find that,
in fact, suicidal behavior varies quite significantly. Some of the
approaches to killing oneself have existed for millennia (i.e.,
poisoning, hanging), whereas others are more contemporary
(e.g., death by cop—instigating an interaction with a police
officer to be killed). Of course, derivations of these methods
exist widely.
The actual meaning a person holds for his or her own
suicide varies by culture, religion, and—I would argue—age. In
some cultures, suicide is to atone for embarrassment, failure, or
humiliation, and is seen as an honorable act. In other cultures, it
is seen as a final step toward receiving a form of religious
reward. In yet another culture, suicide is seen as a manifestation
of mental health problems that will prevent the individual from
being able to get into heaven. These three examples (and many
others) co-exist across the world.
The etiology of suicide for the youngest and oldest groups in
America reflects a similar but differing phenomenon. When
persons younger than 21 years of age or so die by suicide, there
are concerns about developmental issues of maturity,
perspective, temporality, and so forth. Their decisions to die are
often seen as somewhat impulsive and may be associated with
depression and relationship issues. In essence, their limited life
experiences do not allow them the capacity to make the
decision about dying that includes experiences with recovery
from illness or emotional pain, and, as a consequence, few
coping skills have been formulated. In essence, these young
people lack the experience base to contextualize lived
experience, and they have not developed the coping skills
needed to survive.
On the other hand, when elderly persons choose suicide, the
factors are informed by long-term and myriad of experiences
that allow for perspective. Plus, ample opportunity for social
and emotional coping skills has enabled them to weather
previous bouts with depression and loss, emotional pain, and so
forth. Quite often, their calculus of living or dying becomes
more about quality of life issues related to escaping chronic
physical pain and not about transitory emotional pain often
associated with relationship difficulties. The behavior of suicide
DOI: 10.1177/1076217515597272. From 1William & Mary. Address correspondence to: Tracy L. Cross, William & Mary, Moticello, Williamsburg, VA 23185, USA; email: tcross@bsu.edu.
For reprints and permissions queries, please visit SAGE’s Web site at http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav.
Copyright © 2016 The Author(s)
63
GIFTED CHILD TODAY
is similar between these groups, but the underlying factors are
different, wherein the younger group has many years yet to live
and develop the coping repertoire needed to exist in the world,
while the older group has a wealth of experiences that allow for
a much more informed decision.
Suicide Contagion
Through the demographic lens, those who die by suicide
vary by gender, race, region, and age. Groups are studied
and followed over time. Unfortunately for our community,
giftedness is not a characteristic that is collected in national
statistics and consequently, not followed by suicidologists or
thanatologists (those who engage in the scientific study of
death). Over the past 21 years, I have conducted studies on
suicide relative to gifted students and have published
numerous articles, book chapters, and a book. In this
column, I want to share one aspect of the suicide process
that has a contextual basis that is stronger than others: the
phenomenon of suicide contagion. Contagion is described as
the influence of one suicide on the likelihood of another
suicide. This phenomenon is typically thought of in the
context of high profile suicides on others, particularly youth.
An often-cited example is the influence of the suicide of Kurt
Cobain, lead singer of the popular 1990s band Nirvana, on
disenfranchised youth. His suicide is believed to have served
as a catalyst for other suicides and is, therefore, reflective of
a contagion. The issue at hand includes the effects of public
media messaging on large groups of people. Groups
associated with suicide prevention have advocated a more
thoughtful and somewhat controlled use of language when
reporting the deaths of high profile people. Progress has
clearly been made in this area over the past 20 years.
In this column, I want to emphasize a type of contagion that
is less about the suicides of famous people and vast numbers of
interested people, and more about specific contexts (schools)
and suicides of students; in this case, high school and college
campuses. More specifically, I will focus on the phenomenon of
contagion in schools that have reputations of being composed
of very strong students. For the field of gifted education/gifted
studies/talent development, it is imperative that we understand
the suicidal behavior of students with gifts and talents (SWGT).
In some cases, looking at suicide ideation, prevalence rates,
correlates, and factors associated with suicidal behavior is the
most helpful, but, in this case, and for educators, counselors,
and parents of SWGT, considering contagion in the suicidal
process can be more helpful.
By definition, for contagion to exist, an initial suicide
must occur. Once it does, then an increased risk for
subsequent suicides in the same context is produced. It is
important that this possibility be understood not as
something wholly generated by the original suicide per se,
but more like a fire breaking out during dry weather that has
created kindling prone to catch fire once it is prompted by a
64
January 2016
spark. In other words, suicide contagion is kinetic and not
created by an initial suicide. Because this type of risk
assessment is quite difficult to determine with precision, we
must understand what preceded the initial death, and the
status of other SWGT are relative to possibly engaging in
suicidal behavior themselves. The fire metaphor is a good
example because it reveals that there are actually many
aspects to the ecosystem of a forest that precipitate forest
fires. A single fire or lightening strike has differing degrees of
effects based on the totality of the ecosystem. Relative to
suicidal behavior of SWGT in schools, we need to be
cognizant of these factors within its ecosystem.
To understand the ecosystem of individual schools, it is
helpful to begin with the largest influences. Bronfenbrenner’s
(1979) model provides a useful lens to study the ecosystem,
with its nested levels of influence on the individual, from the
most distant, yet pervasive macrosystem to the local
microsystem with which the individual interacts regularly. In the
macrosystem of the United States, cultural aspects are everchanging, with permeating technologies such as the Internet,
smart phones, and television. What are the messages SWGT
receive within the United States relative to giftedness,
intellectualism, and so forth? I would argue that the messages
are at best mixed, often with strong currents of antiintellectualism. Headlines demonstrating contempt for science
and the use of evidence to underpin policy decisions are ever
present in the media.
Regional Variation
Within the United States, there were many similarities and
some differences affecting SWGT across the various regions.
One lens to use in considering regional differences is suicidal
patterns. Generally speaking, in 2010, the highest prevalence
rates of completed suicides among all age groups are in the
Western states (i.e., 13.9 deaths per 100,000 people), whereas
the lowest rates are in the Northeastern states (8.9 per 100,000).
The Midwest and South are in between the other regions, with
the average of all regions of the United States being 12.4 per
100,000.
When one looks at the five states with the highest suicide
prevalence and compares them with the five states with the
lowest prevalence, one factor stands out: the corresponding
percentage of gun ownership. This means that Wyoming,
Alaska, Montana, Nevada, and New Mexico had the highest
prevalence rates of both suicides and gun ownership. In the
same time frame, the District of Columbia, New York, New
Jersey, Maryland, and Massachusetts had the lowest prevalence
rates of both suicide and gun ownership (Cross, 2013; Hoyert &
Xu, 2012). These are merely correlations, so causality cannot be
determined in this manner; however, because access to lethal
means is a primary risk factor for suicide, it stands to reason
that there is likely a connection.
vol. 39 ■ no. 1
Changes Within Our Time
Well known among Americans are the suicides of some of
the best-known artists (e.g., Ernest Hemingway, Sylvia Plath,
Robin Williams), and in some cases, widely respected young
artists (e.g., Stuart Adamson, Kurt Cobain, Ian Curtis, Brad
Davis, Michael Hutchence). These deaths and a myriad of
others, along with contemporary literature, movies, and music,
have made suicide seem like a viable solution (Cross, Cook, &
Dixon, 1996). Moreover, changes in ethical positions and an
increasing sophistication of suicide as a reflection of mental
health issues, rather than focusing on it as an illegal act, have
combined to affect the longstanding taboo against suicidal
behavior in the United States (Cross, 2013; Cross et al., 1996).
These changes reflect how many people in the United States
understand suicide.
Just these examples (the facts that suicides exist, they
receive media attention, many famous people have died by
suicide, there are regional differences in suicide, the relative
access to lethal means vary) are important parts of the suicide
contagion ecosystem of the United States. To make more sense
of this for SWGT, we move into the highest performing schools
and their cultures. Suicide is not a SWGT phenomenon; it is a
human phenomenon. Our efforts to date to establish
prevalence rates of suicide for SWGT have largely been
unsuccessful. Therefore, the most judicious position to take at
this time is that the prevalence rate of suicide for SWGT is
very similar to their same-age peers (Cross, 2013). How then,
do we make sense out of these four examples of multiple
suicides among the students in these very academically able
student populations?
Contagion in Highly Competitive Environments
Although suicide is not specifically a SWGT phenomenon,
there are suicides among this group. It has also been shown
that their lives in school are quite different in some important
ways than their non-gifted peers. For example, many SWGT
deal with a stigma of giftedness (Coleman, 1985; Coleman &
Cross, 1988), mixed messages about giftedness (Cross,
Coleman & Terhaar-Yonkers, 1991), asynchronous
development, multipotentiality, perfectionism, and social
status issues (Cross, 2011) to name a few. Add to these
experiences differential expectations by gender and multiple
exceptionalities, and it is easy to imagine how complicated
are the lives of SWGT. To create social latitude, SWGT
engage in many social coping behaviors. Moreover, as they
get older in school, increasingly, they must specialize in a
talent domain. There are many difficulties associated with
becoming a high achiever within specific talent domains
about which they are passionate. Combined, these factors
make the lives of gifted students very complicated and
stressful. As the former school head of a residential academy
for intellectually gifted adolescents who experienced suicide
contagion, I came to believe after working with a team that
GIFTED CHILD TODAY
conducted three psychological autopsies that these types of
school environments tend to create cultures of highest
performance that the students experience as having constant
expectations with virtually no down time. The nature of the
stress experienced by the students was most often described
as being chronic, inescapable (Cross et al., 1996). More
recently, we found that even with the chronic stress, the
students found positive ways to adapt and were resolute that
the benefits of attending the school and living in the
community outweighed the stress (Rollins & Cross, 2014a,
2014b).
Unique to SWGT is the two-decade-long expectation that
they should do very well in school. Some internalize this;
some become perfectionistic; some withdraw by
underachieving; some get depressed; many feel anxiety. The
chronic nature of the stress, in combination with all of the
aforementioned examples, makes their lives very difficult.
Once they attend schools that are made up of other
outstanding students, although there may be some very
positive experiences, it can exacerbate the chronic nature of
the stress and anxiety.
Making the representation of the lives of SWGT more
complete, add ingredients from the following list: depression,
substance abuse, relationship problems, being homosexual,
while having access to lethal means. The result of this toxic
equation may be the emergence of suicidal ideation, especially
when depression exists. Schools are chock full of students
with these experiences and characteristics. The spark that
ignites a possible contagion is when these variables and
factors exist in the ecosystem and a student, peer, colleague,
or even a friend dies by suicide. For the first time in their lives,
SWGT assess the possibility to alleviate all of their
psychological pain as truly viable. Shneidman (1996) noted
that the state of hopelessness is the last state that precedes the
attempt to take one’s life. It is the accumulation of factors,
characteristics, states, and experiences in the life of an
individual SWGT that makes suicide possible. The added
struggles and suicide correlates increase the chances of
making a suicide attempt. And finally, once a suicide occurs,
the confluence of factors spring forward to lead to other
suicides. Because very few of these students are known as
struggling to the extent they actually are, families and school
employees are often not prepared to intervene in time.
To prevent suicide contagion, we must understand what
makes our schools’ ecosystems easy to spark. Then we should
design, with all the stakeholder groups, intervention strategies
that serve to reduce or eliminate the many aspects of living life
as a SWGT more complicated than other students. By training
educators, parents, and students about how to reduce stress,
how to cope with the mixed messages associated with being a
SWGT, how to self-counsel, how to recognize in oneself and
other students’ feelings of distress, and how and when to refer,
the conditions that allow a spark to turn into suicide contagion
can be minimized.
65
GIFTED CHILD TODAY
Conflict of Interest
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.
January 2016
Cross, T. L., Cook, R. S., & Dixon, D. N. (1996). Psychological autopsies
of three academically talented adolescents who committed suicide.
Journal of Secondary Gifted Education, 7, 403-409.
Hoyert, D. L., & Xu, J. Q. (2012). Deaths: Preliminary data for 2011
(National Vital Statistics Reports, Vol. 61, No. 6). Hyattsville, MD:
National Center for Health Statistics.
Rollins, M. R., & Cross, T. L. (2014a). Assessing the psychological changes
of gifted students attending a residential high school with an outcome
measurement. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 37, 337-354.
References
Rollins, M. R., & Cross, T. L. (2014b). A deeper investigation into the
psychological changes of intellectually gifted students attending a
residential academy. Roeper Review, 36, 18-29.
Bronfenbrenner, U. (1979). The ecology of human development: Experiments
by nature and design. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Shneidman, E. S. (1996). The suicidal mind. Oxford, UK: Oxford University
Press.
Coleman, L. J. (1985). Schooling the gifted. Menlo Park, NJ: AddisonWesley.
Coleman, L. J., & Cross, T. L. (1988). Is being gifted a social handicap?
Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 11, 41-56.
Cross, T. L. (2011). On the social and emotional lives of gifted children (4th
ed.). Waco, TX: Prufrock Press.
Cross, T. L. (2013). Suicide among gifted children and adolescents:
Understanding the suicidal mind. Waco, TX: Prufrock Press.
Cross, T. L., Coleman, L. J., & Terhaar-Yonkers, M. (1991). The
social cognition of gifted adolescents in schools: Managing the
stigma of giftedness. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 15,
44-55.
66
Bio
Tracy L. Cross, PhD, holds an endowed chair, the Jody and
Layton Smith Professor of Psychology and Gifted Education,
and is the executive director of the Center for Gifted
Education at William and Mary. He has published widely in
the field, particularly focusing on the psychological nature
and needs of gifted children. He has served as editor of four
major research journals in Gifted Education and is Past
President of NAGC.
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References:
Rotheram-Fuller, E., Kasari, C., Chamberlain, B., & Locke, J. (2010). Social involvement of
children with autism spectrum disorders in elementary school classrooms. Journal of
Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 51(11), 1227-1234. doi:10.1111/j.14697610.2010.02289.x
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Keywords: autism spectrum disorders, inclusion, elementary classroom, cooperative learning,
classroom acceptance
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