“Psychiatrists agree now on a point that was long debated: Suicide can run in families. They do not know, however, how this risk is transferred from one family member to another — whether it is ”learned” behavior, passed on through a grim emotional ripple effect, or a genetic inheritance, as some scientists theorize. But new research published this week in the American Journal of Psychiatry prepares ground for a genetic search, suggesting that the trait that links high-suicide families is not simply mental illness, but mental illness combined with a more specific tendency to ”impulsive aggressiveness.”” Boston Globe It appears obvious to me it is not simply a matter of biology or upbringing; we’re supposed to be way beyond that sort of dichotomous thinking by now. I have seen multi-suicide families where it seems a matter of unconscious identification or even conscious emulation, others where the biological depression-plus-impulsive-aggressive-proneness model makes the most sense, but usually it appears they work in tandem — some balance between being genetically vulnerable and having your thoughts shaped by the belief that it is your destiny to die by your own hand.