Suicide: A Psychoanalytical Approach

Authors: Carmona Parra JA* and Villada Yépez JL

DOI: 10.23880/pprij-16000306

Volume 7, Issue 3

Abstract

Review article. A review of Freud and Lacan’s work was performed, so as to contribute to the comprehension of the suicide phenomenon. An examination of the classic texts of these psychoanalysis experts was carried out, in order to put these into dialogue with 50 articles which concern the suicide phenomenon, published in Scopus journals. The search was organized around six topics: subjective division, the jouissance drive, the dynamics of desire, clinical structures, real, symbolic, and imaginary registries, and the fall of ideals in adolescents. The article concludes that there is no suicide subjectivity, in the sense of a unique profile of subjects whose characteristics would permit the prediction of greater likeliness to end one’s life. Suicide, similarly, is non-exclusive to a specific psychopathology. It cannot even be said that only those who suffer from some types of psychological illness will present some suicide risk. In other words, psychoanalysis affirms that one must be prepared to encounter suicide, and all self-destructive processes, in all clinical pictures, and further, in the psychopathology of daily life

Keywords: Suicide; Self-destructive behavior; Psychoanalysis; Death drive; Jouissance

View PDF