Now on ScienceBlogs: Twitter: as in actual science jargon (something to do with marmosets and shrews)

Seed Media Group

Collective Imagination

Deltoid

Do the Japanese count some murders as suicides?

Tim Starr writes: Japan classifies cases of husbands murdering their wives & kids then killing themselves as all suicides, no homicides, thus skewing their statistics in favor of suicides & against homicides. This claim is easily seen to be false:...

Search

Profile

Tim Lambert Tim Lambert (deltoidblog AT gmail.com) is a computer scientist at the University of New South Wales.

Wikio - Top Blogs - Sciences

Deltoid Facebook Group

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Categories

Archives

Full archives

Links

Blogroll

16th

« Kleck’s DGU numbers | Main | Kleck’s DGU numbers »

Do the Japanese count some murders as suicides?

Category: japan
Posted on: December 25, 1996 8:47 AM, by Tim Lambert

Tim Starr writes:

Japan classifies cases of husbands murdering their wives & kids then killing themselves as all suicides, no homicides, thus skewing their statistics in favor of suicides & against homicides.

This claim is easily seen to be false: You just have to look at the Japanese suicide statistics. There are no recorded suicides of small children.

That doesn't necessarily falsify the claim. How are "small children" defined?

Under 5. And the suicide rate for 5-14 year olds is half of the US rate.

How do you know that "family suicides" in Japan don't usually take place when the children are no longer "small"?

Because I've actually read something on the subject. A typical "family suicide" involves a mother of small children killing her children and herself. Just because the literal translation of the Japanese word for this is "family suicide", it does not follow that the homicide of the children is officially recorded as suicide.

See: R, Markman & D. Bosco, "Alone with the Devil," 342ff (1989). Iga, Mamoru "The thorn in the chrysanthemum : suicide and economic
success in modern Japan"

Share on: Stumbleupon Reddit Email + More

TrackBacks

TrackBack URL for this entry: http://scienceblogs.com/mt/pings/93403

ScienceBlogs

Search ScienceBlogs:

Go to:

Advertisement
Enter to win a free copy of The Monty Hall Problem
Visit the Collective Imagination blog
Advertisement
Collective Imagination

© 2006-2009 Seed Media Group LLC. ScienceBlogs is a registered trademark of Seed Media Group. All rights reserved.

Sites by Seed Media Group: Seed Media Group | ScienceBlogs | SEEDMAGAZINE.COM