Suicide Argumentative Analysis

Suicide is the third leading cause of teenage death in the United States. If this is the case why wouldn’t there be more prevention programs out there for these teenagers? Suicide prevention in schools is up for debate on whether or not it would have a positive effect on teenagers, or a negative impact on their state of mind. According to the study “A Review and Application of Suicide Prevention Programs in High School Settings,” by Gregory Cooper, Cooper declares that in the long run prevention programs in schools would be beneficial to suicidal students. However, Dena Wanner the author of the study “The Impact of a Comprehensive Suicide Prevention Program on Knowledge, Attitudes, Awareness, and Response to Suicidal Youths,” believes that

in the end there has to be more research done to prove these suicide prevention programs in schools effective, and essentially thinks that these programs would have a destructive impact.
Suicide has been around for ages, but prevention in schools is fairly new. Suicide has gone through a change were suicide rates were once low, but as of more recently have risen. Along with the suicide rates sky rocketing, the age of which people complete suicide is getting younger and younger. Kids as young as the age of six have recently committed suicide, which compared to the “usual” older than fifteen age group, is a drastic difference. As generations pass, suicide seems to be the only answer to trouble, therefore this topic is still, and forever will be controversial until there is change in prevention programs. As previously stated suicide prevention in schools are new since the topic of suicide can have a moral or religious debate, and was considered to be taboo for years. There are religions that believe suicide is the ultimate sin, and depending on one’s belief suicide prevention should not be discussed. But as time goes by and suicide becoming common for teenagers, schools need to take action in order to protect their students.
Beginning with Cooper and his study “A Review and Application of Suicide Prevention Programs…” written in 2011, and published by Informa Healthcare USA Inc. Cooper claims that schools involvement in suicide prevention is important and if handled properly, effective for teenagers. Cooper supports his claim by both having done research along with his own assumption that “school is the nexus for teen life” (2011) therefore is the right place to talk about suicide and have preventative programs.
However, arguing Cooper’s belief that schools suicide prevention programs would be effective, Dena Wanner author of "The Impact of a Comprehensive Suicide Prevention Program…” written in 2007 and published by Viewcontent.cgi, claims that there is not enough research done on suicide prevention programs in schools for it to be considered effective by anyone. Wanner supports her claim by having done research herself on suicide prevention programs, along with doing evidence by doing tests on schools to see how they would fair with having preventative programs.
When I first started to look for two arguments, I came to realize how hard it can be to find to arguments that are arguing similar things.

Many argumentative studies argue the same “broad topic” but are not specifically arguing the narrowed topic. So when I came across these two studies, I knew that it was as close as I was going to get to having two arguments for suicide prevention in schools. The general criteria I established in order to evaluate these two arguments was to see if the studies were published to credible publishers, if they had done their own background research and that the arguments were not all based off of opinion, and if they were time relevant. My specific criteria for evaluating the two studies were that they both had to have sufficient history on suicide itself or suicide prevention, discussion of how schools have handled suicide prevention programs in the past or present, and to have argued the topic with an open mind, or to look at the topic from different points of views. Cooper’s and Wanner’s studies have met my established criteria is most ways, except for time relevance. Both of these studies were done more than 5 years ago, which can mean that the information may be outdated. Although, reading through the studies I found out that suicide has always been a relevant topic and that not much has changed since five years ago besides the suicide

rates.
Starting with Cooper’s argument I first evaluated the strengths of his argument. When first reading his argument, I gave him credit for it being a study, and in study outline, therefore things were easy to find and his arguments/research was laid out in a clear matter. In the study he has a section called the “Scope of the Problem” which was his history on the matter of suicide. I found this credible because as I was reading it, I understood that he had done his own research on the general problem of suicide, and he had facts along with his own opinion of those said facts. I also found that one of his strongest points in the argument, was the he argued that matter of mental illnesses. There is no one cause for suicide, but mental illnesses such as depression, is a major risk factor in teenagers and their actions/thoughts about suicide (Cooper, 2011). Cooper also talks about the other factors that may contribute to suicide such as if a gun is in the home, poor problem solving skills, race, sexual orientation, perception of weight and language barriers (Cooper, 2011). Seeing that Cooper takes into consideration of multiple risk factors for teenagers, it helps him and his readers, understand what the underlying problem of suicide may be. Another strong point of Cooper’s argument, is his research done on suicide prevention in schools. Cooper first talks about the “federal attention to the issue of adolescent suicide.” Which is the Youth Suicide and Prevention Act of 1985. This act provided the funds and means necessary for school-based prevention programs (Cooper, 2011). Then Cooper late discusses President George W. Bush’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health in 2002. By Cooper going farther back in history and government actions, it proves that he has really done his research on the topic.
With Cooper’s strengths, there are also weaknesses in his argument. In the very beginning of Cooper’s study he states that “there have been many suicide prevention programs that have been developed, but very few that show statistically significant effectiveness.” By stating this, Cooper almost contradicts what his study is about. Although, on the other hand it may just be him looking at the issue from another perspective, which is therefore credible of him. Another disadvantage that Cooper’s study has is that he never actually went to schools and questioned the students/ staff members personally about the issue of school-based suicide prevention. Therefore many of his opinions are created from other people’s studies, and not from the main source.
Moving on to Wanner’s argument, I evaluated the strengths of her study. One of the very first things that I noticed about Wanner’s argument was that it was long, and done by only here. This made me believe that she did very extensive research on the topic of school-based suicide prevention programs. Another aspect that I noticed in Wanner’s study was that she had broken it down into sections such as introduction, history, method, participants and results etc. This made it easy for her readers to follow along with what she was discussing. With that in mind, Wanner would also define, and explain her terms of phrases. This leads me to believe that even though it is a long stud, it is not only meant for a scholarly audience but for other audiences as well. The one aspect that stood out the most to me was that Wanner went to different school districts to collect data from the school’s students and staff members. By doing so, Wanner strengthened her argument because she got information and opinions about school based-suicide prevention programs from the actual source, being teenage kids.
Even though Wanner has many strengths, I evaluated her arguments weaknesses also. When reading this study, the first thing I noticed was that Wanner did not talk about mental illnesses or other risk factors for suicide, which is a glaring omission and should be noted when discussing suicide. Risk factors, and mental illnesses should be noted because they would change the way how one handles suicide, and the preventative measures taken. Another weakness in Wanner’s argument that I noticed was that Wanner only went and interviewed the schools based on the SAFE: TEEN suicide prevention program. This could contradict her study because she only based her results from that particular suicide prevention programs curriculum, when there are a variety of different preventative suicide programs.
While reading Cooper and Wanner’s studies, I was evaluating their rhetorical appeals, starting with ethos.

Both Cooper and Wanner are a part of the scientific medical field. Cooper is has a Bachelor of Science in Nursing and works for the Christiana Care Health System, and has done multiple collaborative studies. Wanner on the other hand, is a psychologist with a master’s degree from Pacific University, School of Professional Psychology. Considering that these two authors are “professionals” in the medical field, it makes me believe that they are credible and are competent enough to realistically write about

suicide.
After evaluating Cooper’s and Wanner’s studies for ethos, I looked at their use of the rhetorical appeal, logos. Both Cooper and Wanner’s studies had a long list of references, statistics, and many incite citations. When first looking for two arguments to use, a longer list of references was one of my criteria because as the reader, I needed to know that my authors did sufficient research. Overall, I believe that Wanner had the better logos appeal, because her list of references was longer, and the study was written by only written by her, whereas Cooper’s study was done with two other colleagues.
Since both Cooper’s and Wanner’s arguments are studies, there is not much of the rhetorical appeal pathos. However, suicide in itself is a sensitive and emotional topic, so even the statistic “Suicide is the third leading cause of death among youths ages 14-19” (Cooper, 2011) may invoke a reaction. Even though Cooper has emotional statistics, I believe that Wanner once again had the better rhetorical appeal. I say this because when she interviewed the students/ stuff members at the 12 schools, 11% of kids would not tell someone that they were suicidal (Wanner, 2007). Reading this invoked a reaction in myself, and that reaction was the either hug that 11% of students, or want to be the reason that that 11% of kids that wouldn’t tell someone about their feelings, to a 0%.
Lastly, I evaluated the rhetorical appeal of Kairos. As previously stated in the beginning of this paper, both Cooper and Wanner’s studies are over 5 years old, meaning that the studies may not be the most up to date, although the topic of suicide prevention is still controversial. However, out of the two arguments Cooper’s study is more recent being done in the year 2011 therefore his would have to be the better one out of the two arguments based off of the Kairos appeal.
Coming to an end with my evaluations of Cooper and Wanner’s studies, I looked for arguments from principle, argument from consequences, and argument from precedent/analogy. Starting with argument from principle, neither Cooper nor Wanner’s studies had this. This could once again be considered a glaring omission. Stated earlier in the paper, religion may be one of the reasons as to why there are not many school-based preventative programs, considering suicide is a sin in certain religions. For example, in Christianity suicide is highly frowned up, but in Islamic religion and Hinduism it is the ultimate sin. Under those circumstances, I believe that Cooper and Wanner should have had an argument from principle. Moving on to argument from consequences, I found that while booth Cooper and Wanner did have this type of argument in their studies, Wanner had a bigger discussion about it. Wanner explained that “suicide programs would increase knowledge, favorable attitudes, awareness, and help-seeking behaviors,” but on the other hand, there were certain staff members that though “having suicide-prevention programs in school may make certain students think more about suicide, or become suicidal” (Wanner, 2007). Although, it seems as though both Cooper and Wanner would have to agree that by not having school-based suicide prevention programs suicide rates would either stay the same, or climb higher. Lastly, there is not much of an argument from precedent/analogy in neither Cooper nor Wanner’s studies. I say this because although both are discussing school-based prevention programs, they are not in the same year nor the same situation.
In the overall analysis of Cooper and Wanner’s studies on the argument of school-based suicide prevention programs I believe that it is important to understand both sides of the controversy. Having suicide prevention programs in schools is optimal, but there are a lot of aspects that need to be taken into consideration before anything happens. In the end, the audience may side with Cooper’s study by believing that with the right tools suicide prevention programs may ideally help put a stop to suicide, but realistically Wanner suggests that there needs to be more evidence supporting these programs in order for them to be found beneficial to everyone. The heart of the matter is that suicide is a global issue that people, mainly teenagers, are dealing with and they need help. Whether or not they get help from school-based suicide prevention programs, is ultimately up to the people of the world and what they as a society, think is right.