SOS Signs of Suicide Program

The SOS Signs of Suicide® Program (SOS) is a school-based suicide prevention program that serves secondary school students ages 13 to 18. The program teaches students that suicide is directly related to mental illness—typically depression—and that it is not a normal reaction to stress or emotional upset. This approach stands in direct contrast to other programs that seek to destigmatize suicide by separating it from mental illness. SOS concentrates on teaching youths to recognize the signs of suicide and depression in themselves and others and the specific actions needed to respond to those signs. SOS is also currently being used in other nonschool settings that serve youth.

The program's primary objectives are to educate teens that depression is a treatable illness and to equip them to respond to a potential suicide in a friend or family member using the SOS technique.

There have been two published studies evaluating the SOS program. In one of the studies significantly lower rates of suicide attempts and greater knowledge and more adaptive attitudes about depression and suicide were observed among students in the intervention group. The modest changes in knowledge and attitudes partially explained the beneficial effects of the program on suicide attempts. The research found that SOS was the first school-based suicide prevention program to demonstrate significant reductions in self-reported suicide attempts in a study using a randomized experimental design.