16,648 reasons to live instead of dying by suicide: insights from a computer-assisted content analysis

AI Summary

Analysis of 16,648 Reddit self-reports reveals lived reasons people chose life over suicide using novel computer-assisted qualitative content analysis.
Identified categories and organising themes both affirm prior findings and offer new connections between reasons to live, reasons to die, and wellbeing.
Study demonstrates scalable, interpretable computer-assisted methods and highlights theoretical and clinical directions for suicide prevention research and practice.

AI Summary

Moreover, the existing use of reasons to live in assessment and treatment is generally grounded in inventories of questions that, while groundbreaking and well validated, were developed decades ago and without a focus on individuals' lived experiences.

In this study, an online user's query to formerly suicidal people on the popular Reddit platform afforded a novel opportunity to investigate reasons people lived in a large, naturally occurring sample of 16,648 self-reports about their experiences.

Using a new method for computer-assisted qualitative content analysis, we identify categories, and themes organizing those categories, that affirm prior work and also provide new perspectives on that work, as well as suggesting connections between ideas in the literatures on reasons people die, reasons people live, and subjective and psychological well-being.

Basic summary

Sci Rep. 2026 Jul 7. doi: 10.1038/s41598-026-58537-4. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Most research on suicide focuses on the progression toward lethal action. Fewer studies have looked at individuals’ past experiences with the desire to die and why they did not die by suicide. Moreover, the existing use of reasons to live in assessment and treatment is generally grounded in inventories of questions that, while groundbreaking and well validated, were developed decades ago and without a focus on individuals’ lived experiences. In this study, an online user’s query to formerly suicidal people on the popular Reddit platform afforded a novel opportunity to investigate reasons people lived in a large, naturally occurring sample of 16,648 self-reports about their experiences. Using a new method for computer-assisted qualitative content analysis, we identify categories, and themes organizing those categories, that affirm prior work and also provide new perspectives on that work, as well as suggesting connections between ideas in the literatures on reasons people die, reasons people live, and subjective and psychological well-being. The study highlights the value of computer-assisted methods as a way of achieving both scale and interpretable results, and it identifies a number of theoretical and clinical avenues for further investigation.

PMID:42414384 | DOI:10.1038/s41598-026-58537-4

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