Indonesian online newspaper reporting of suicidal behavior: Compliance with World Health Organization media guidelines

Background: Despite the lack of attention, suicide is a major public and mental health problem in Indonesia. Research on how Indonesian newspapers portray suicide case has been lacking. Aim: To assess the quality of Indonesian online newspaper reporting suicide news and its compliance with the World Health Organization (WHO) mass media reporting guidelines. Methods: The content of suicide news reported in online newspapers was searched and scrutinized against the WHO suicide reporting guidelines. Results: Within the duration of 6 months, there were 548 suicide news reported. This consisted of 16.8% attempted suicide and 83.2% completed suicide. Approximately 90.3% reported age, 97.3% reported gender and 64.3% reported the marital status of the victims. Furthermore, 68% reported the methods of suicide in headline or title, 40.5% shown the picture of the victims and 56.6% shown illustration only, and 67.2% reported life event related to suicide act. Conclusion: The vast majority of online newspapers in Indonesia exaggerate suicide news. They rarely inform the readers that there is hope and help available. The majority also do not conform to the WHO media guidelines.