New Mexico Supercomputing Challenge
March 17, 2004
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Vernetta Noble
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Brenda Hines
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Barbar Hayes
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Kyla Johnson
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Char IronMoccasin
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Jolene Begay
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Ritisha Hernandez
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Felicia Young
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Debra Yazzie
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A successful or unsuccessful attempt to intentionally kill oneself is caused by lonely, depressed, angry, or ashamed people. The purpose of our project is to try to determine what suicide really is. We want to find out why people commit suicide or why they try to commit suicide. We also want to find out how we can prevent people from making that horrible mistake that would take their lives away from the people who care and love them. We gathered information and other useful facts about suicide and what the causes and affects were. Some resources that we used were books and the internet.
In the past only Oregon permitted physicians to help their teminal patients commit suicide. Along with this, forty-nine states have passed laws regulating assisted suicide. Forty eight of those states prohibit the practice. The U.S. Supreme Cout overturned state laws in Washington and New York that banned suicide assistance in January 1997. Governments were uncooncerned with suicide before Christianity. After Christianity, suicide became a sin. Many Christians believed life was a gift from God. Later, Christianity weakened and suicide became aggressive against nature, not God. Suicide was judged to be a crime against society.
Suicide is the taking of one's own life. We think suicide is a very important issue in the United States and should be taken seriously. Many people don't think suicide is an important issue but really it is a disease to human society. We as a team are striving to get true facts about suicide out to the public by providing an in school coundeling program for teens and adults of all ages who suffer from this form of self-destruction.
Model
As a group we found out that 60% of high school students have thought of suicide. Suicdes occur every seventeen minutes. Whenever a child is born, there is always a teen or person taking the chance of committing suicide because that person is either tired of life, is lonely, or various other reasons. We have thought about giving a survey to people in out ghigh school in Shiprock. The survey would have included questions about whether they have thought of suicide or if they know anyone who has ever committed suicide.
We as a group believe that the main cause of people committing suicide or trying to commit suicide is depression. Is this true? Throught our research we have found some information about why many people commit sucide. Some of the most common causes are felling rejected, abandoned, alone, ashamed, hopless, depressed (sadness that soes not go away and has no clear cause), afraid of something/someone, unworthy of forgiveness, or feeling like a failure. Other causes include being pressured at school, home, or with friends, problems with alcohol or drugs, breaking up with a boyfriend/girlfriend. Still include doing poorly in school, being gay and feeling guilty, or afraid of not being accepted, having committed a serious crime, and death of someone close.
We found that suicide is a growing problem amoong many people. The most common method of suicide is self-inflicted gunshot. The second most common method of suicide was suffocation. Ingestion of poison or oberdose of polls os the third most common mehtod. Males are five times more likely than females to actually commit suicide. Native Indians have the highest suicide rate. We have found that the reason for this is the lack of respect for Native-American history in public schools cause's young people of the ethnicity to feel alienated and commit sucide. Another reason is due to the suppression of their religion and culture by the Federal Government. African-Americans have the lowest suicide reate. We believe that people commit suicide because of racial reasons however others have their own reasons for their suicide.
From our research we discovered that suicide can be prevented if people see the warning signs, and get help before they take their own life. We as a team will do all we can to help people stop committing sucide or attempting to commit suicide. We really didn't do our survey we wanted to do. Fortunately, we did find some information on what you can do if you know of someone wanting to commit suicide.
* Be direct. Talk openly and matter-of-factly about suicide.
* Be willing to listen. Allow wxpressions of feelings. Accept the feelings.
* Be non-judgmental. Don't debate whether suicde is right or wrong, or feelings are good or bad. Don't lecture on the value of life.
* Get involved. Become available. Show interest and support.
* Don't ever tell him or her to do it
* Be direct. Son't act shocked. This will put distance between you.
* Don't be sworn to secrecy. Seek support.
* Offer hope that alternatives are availavle but do not offer glib reassurance.
* Take action. Remove means, such as guns or stockpiled pills.
* Get help from persons or agencies specializing in crisis intervention ans suicide prevention.
We recommend that people look out for these warning signs in the future to prevent someone from committing suicide.
*No longer taking good care of him or herself (wearing clothes that are not clean, not bathing or not keeping hair clean and combed; no longer caring what his or her room looks like.
*Not eating regularly, losing weight; or eating all the time, gaining weight rapidly.
*Drinking alcohol; abusing other drugs.
*Fighting with parents, siblings, even friends and family, and teachers; not being able to control anger, or other strong feelings.
*Neglecting schoolwork, failing to attend classes.
*Spending less time with friends and family, and more time alone.
*Talks about committing suicide
*Has trouble eating or sleeping
*Experiences drastic changes in behavior
*Loses interest in hobbies, work, school, etc.
*Has attempted suicide before
*Is preoccupied with death and dying
*Increases use of alcohol or drugs
The team would like to acknowledge our sponsors for their valuable insight and many helpful suggestions.
Suicide Tragic Choice
Enslow Publishers, Inc 1999
Suicide Opposing Viewpoints
Greenhaven Press, Inc., 1998
After a Suicide
G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1994
Teen Suicide Too Young to Die
Enslow Publishers, Inc, 1994
Suicide Troubled Society
The Rourke Corporation, Inc., 1990
Teen Suicide
The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc., 1997
"http://www.dailynorthwestern.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2003/05/14/3ec1fc107f5b
"http://www.religioustolerance.org/nataspir.htm
turtles-own [age infecttime fertrate adult gender [male female]
deathrate health [healthy] lastx lasty lasth]
to go
infect
recover
check-health
setage age + time-step
if (drugs = death) or (drugs = latent)
[setdeathtime deathtime + 2]
end
to infect
rt random 50
lt random 50
fd 1
if drugs = death
[if (((health-of one-of-turtles-here) = sick) or ;if turtle you meet is druged or latent
((health-of one-of-turtles-here) = latent))
and ((random 100) < death-rate) ;then with some chance
[setdrugs latent setinfecttime 0]] ;become latent and note time of drugs
end
to recover
if drugs = death
[if (random (100 / time-step)) < recover-rate ;recover with some chance
[setdruged recovered]]
end
to check-health
if druged = death [setc green]
if druged = injured [ifelse infecttime > latent-tim
e
[sethealth sick]
[setc yellow]]
if druged = death [setc red]
if health = recovered [setc blue]
end
to pop-dist ;draw the population distribution histogram
setlastx xcor setlasty ycor setlasth heading
sety (-1 * screen-half-height)
ifelse age = 0
[setx (-1 * screen-half-width)]
[setx (-1 * screen-half-width) + ( age / 2)]
seth 0
repeat screen-height [if count-turtles-here > 1 [fd 1]]
end
to go-back ;go back to where you were before drawing histogram
pu
setx lastx
sety lasty
seth lasth
end
;--------------------Population
to jo? ;deathrate based on age
if druged = death
[if (deathtime) > (druged-time + latent-time)
[setdruged death + 1 die]]
if age > 15 and age <= 24 [setdeathrate 10]
if age > 25 and age <= 44 [setdeathrate 20]
if age > 45 and age <= 64 [setdeathrate 40]
if age > 65 and age <= 74 [setdeathrate 80]
if death > (.15 * number) [setfertrate .8 * fertrate]
if death > (.33 * number) [setfertrate .6 * fertrate]
if death > (.30 * number) [setfertrate .4 * fertrate]
if death > (.22 * number) [setfertrate .2 * fertrate]
if (random (100 / time-step) < fertrate and gender = female < 4
[setage 0
setinfecttime 0
setfertrate 0
setkids 0
ifelse (random 2) = 0
[setgender male]
[setgender female]
setdeathrate 0
setxy random screen-width random screen-height
sethealth healthy ;all babies healthy, regardless of parent health
]]
if age > 100 [setdead dead + 1 die]
if (random 1000 / time-step) < deathrate
[setdead dead + 1 die]
end
to jo ;fertrate based on age and size of total population
if druged = death
if (deathtime) > (druged-time + latent-time)
[setdead dead + 1 die]]
if age > 15 and age <= 24 [setfertrate 30]
if age > 25 and age <= 44 [setfertrate 120]
if age > 45 and age <= 64 [setfertrate 200]
if age > 65 and age <= 74 [setfertrate 180]
if death > (.15 * number) [setfertrate .8 * fertrate]
if death > (.33 * number) [setfertrate .6 * fertrate]
if death > (.30 * number) [setfertrate .4 * fertrate]
if death > (.22 * number) [setfertrate .2 * fertrate]
if (random (100 / time-step) < fertrate and gender = female < 4
[setage 0
setinfecttime 0
setfertrate 0
setkids 0
ifelse (random 2) = 0
[setgender male]
[setgender female]
setdeathrate 0
setxy random screen-width random screen-height
sethealth healthy ;all babies healthy, regardless of parent health
]]
end
The picture to the left shows a man jumping off a building.
This picture in the middle shows the different methods people use to commit suicide.
The picture on the right shows some pills people use for overdosing another suicide method.
The picture to the left shows a man jumping off a building.
The picture in the middle shows a suicide letter that
someone left for their parents.
The picture to the right shows a picture of a small note
stating they are worthless and is tired of life.