Why Do People Hurt Themselves?

By Matthew K. Nock. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 2009

954 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) is a prevalent but perplexing behavior problem in which people deliberately harm themselves without lethal intent. Research reveals that NSSI typically has its onset during early adolescence; most often involves cutting or carving the skin; and appears equally prevalent across sexes, ethnicities, and socioeconomic statuses. Less is known about why people engage in NSSI. This article presents a theoretical model of the development and maintenance of NSSI. Rather than a symptom of mental disorder, NSSI is conceptualized as a harmful behavior that can serve several intrapersonal (e.g., affect regulation) and interpersonal (e.g., help-seeking) functions. Risk of NSSI is increased by general factors that contribute to problems with affect regulation or interpersonal communication (e.g., childhood abuse) and by specific factors that influence the decision to use NSSI rather than some other behavior to serve these functions (e.g., social modeling). This model synthesizes research from several different areas of the literature and points toward several lines of research needed to further advance the understanding of why people hurt themselves.

Subfields: Clinical Psychology, Health

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a47f032367a76d72b14c48194abb478356bef631

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Citations in the corpus

The Four-Function Model of Nonsuicidal Self-Injury (2014, methodology): “Our aim in the present review was to use the recently developed, empirically supported four-function model (FFM) of NSSI (Nock, 2009, 2010; Nock & Prinstein, 2004) as a conceptual base to generate important next steps for research on self-injury.”
Non-suicidal Self-Injury in Adolescence: The Role of Shame, Self-Criticism and Fear of Self-Compassion (2016, background): “Theoretical frameworks have emerged to explain how NSSI may serve specific functions and motivations that maintain and reinforce these behaviors (Gratz & Chapman, 2009; Klonsky et al., 2011; Nock, 2009).”
Measuring the suicidal mind: implicit cognition predicts suicidal behavior (2010, background): “More specifically, an implicit association with death/suicide may represent one of the final steps in the pathway to suicide that is activated when a person is deciding how to respond to extreme distress (Nock, 2009).”
Is Nonsuicidal Self-Injury Associated With Parenting and Family Factors? (2014, background): “Both Nock (2009a) and Prinstein (2008) have pointed out the importance of examining distal and proximal family risk factors for the further understanding of possible pathways to NSSI.”
Understanding Emotion in Adolescents: A Review of Emotional Frequency, Intensity, Instability, and Clarity (2018, background): “In addition to mood and anxiety disorders, emotional experience is important in considering nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI), which occurs among as many as 13–23% of adolescents (Klonsky & Muehlenkamp, 2007; Nock, 2009) and is a risk factor for suicidality (Guan, Fox, & Prinstein, 2012).”
Why Do People Hurt Themselves? A New Conceptual Model of Nonsuicidal Self-Injury (2018, background): “The core of the model has remained the same across subsequent articulations (Bentley, Nock, & Barlow, 2014; Nock, 2008, 2009, 2010).”
Nonsuicidal Self-Injury, Suicidal Behavior, and Their Co-occurrence as Viewed Through the Lens of the Interpersonal Theory of Suicide (2012, background): “…(NSSI; i.e., direct, self-inflicted damage of one’s own body tissue without the intent to die and for purposes that are not socially sanctioned; Nock, 2009), prevalence estimates suggest that the behavior occurs among about 4% of adults (Klonsky, Oltmanns, & Turkheimer, 2003), 17% of…”