Suicide as escape from self.

1990/01/01 by Roy F. Baumeister · 1,800 citations
Arts and Humanities · Psychology · #Affect (linguistics) #Causal chain #Cognition #Cognitive psychology #Communication #Epistemology #Irrationality #Mental Health and Psychiatry #Personality Disorders and Psychopathology #Psychology #Psychotherapy Techniques and Applications #Rationality #Self #Self-awareness #Social psychology

paper · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.97.1.90

published in Psychological Review 97(1), 90-113 (American Psychological Association)

openalex publication_date 1990/01/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/06

Abstract

Suicide is analyzed in terms of motivations to escape from aversive self-awareness. The causal chain begins with events that fall severely short of standards and expectations. These failures are attributed internally, which makes self-awareness painful. Awareness of the self's inadequacies generates negative affect, and the individual therefore desires to escape from self-awareness and the associated affect. The person tries to achieve a state of cognitive deconstruction (constricted temporal focus, concrete thinking, immediate or proximal goals, cognitive rigidity, and rejection of meaning), which helps prevent meaningful self-awareness and emotion. The deconstructed state brings irrationality and disinhibition, making drastic measures seem acceptable. Suicide can be seen as an ultimate step in the effort to escape from self and world.

Citations

• Learned helplessness in humans: Critique and reformulation.
• Masochism as escape from self
• Self-discrepancy: A theory relating self and affect.

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• The Social Roots of Suicide: Theorizing How the External Social World Matters to Suicide and Suicide Prevention. [europepmc]
• Just-in-Time Adaptive Interventions for Suicide Prevention: Promise, Challenges, and Future Directions. [europepmc]

Related

• The interpersonal theory of suicide.
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