THE CASE OF THE BRITISH PRESS ON MALE YOUTH SUICIDE - Term Paper Example

This memoire describes how the issue of male youth suicide can be studied using Beeghley’s (1999) methodology. A large part of the memoire has gone into introducing the concept of suicide and the varying definitions of suicide, followed by setting the context for further discussion of the subject. An analysis of press articles is done to study how the press problematised the issue. Male youth suicide rates more than doubled between 1970-1998, and became a major concern for the society. In such a situation, the media’s role in acting as the moral entrepreneur, as per Cohen’s theory of moral panic, is worth noting.

The main aim of the memoire is to investigate how the private issue of suicide was made a social problem by the press. Beeghley’s methodology was used for this purpose because unlike the methodologies by Rubington and Weinberg (2002), Best (2007) and Mooney (2011), his methodology assumes a more empirical approach through hypothesis testing. The memoire begins with the varying definitions of a social problem and the methodologies that are used to studying social problems. It goes on to state the justification for using Beeghley’s methodology in detail.

This section is followed by a detailed description of Beeghley’s methodology and how it can be applied to studying social problems. The three aspects of the methodology include studying the “extent of harm” of a social problem, “identification and political recognition” of a social problem, and “need for improvement” of a social condition. These three components correspond to the correspond to the objective, subjective and optimistic components of social problems.