Suicidal Ideation in Online Spaces Through the Lens of Interpersonal Theory of Suicide: Exploratory Study of Self-Disclosure, Peer Support, and AI Responses
A peer-reviewed exploratory study analysing 59,607 Reddit r/SuicideWatch posts through the Interpersonal Theory of Suicide (IPTS) framework, categorising expressions of suicidal ideation by IPTS dimensions and risk factors, and comparing human peer-support responses with AI chatbot responses to those posts. Expert evaluators rated response quality across coherence, personalization, and emotional depth.
Key Findings
- Loneliness was the most frequently expressed IPTS dimension (about 20% of posts); thwarted belongingness about 14%, perceived burdensomeness about 6%, and acquired capability about 3%
- High-risk posts frequently referenced planning, attempts, and methods or tools
- AI-generated replies showed higher structural coherence and semantic similarity but were rated significantly lower on personalization, emotional depth, and diversity than human peer responses
- Grounding computational analysis in IPTS gave richer theoretical interpretability of online suicidal ideation than atheoretical machine-learning approaches
Methodology Notes
Exploratory computational study of 59,607 r/SuicideWatch posts; IPTS-based categorisation plus psycholinguistic and content analysis; expert clinical evaluation of peer versus AI chatbot responses (inter-rater agreement Cohen's kappa about 0.74). Observational single-subreddit social-media data limits generalizability. Submitted 21 October 2025, accepted 31 March 2026, published 3 June 2026 (JMIR AI, vol 5, e86265). This is the peer-reviewed publication of an earlier arXiv preprint (2504.13277) by the same authors.
Sources
JMIR AI article (primary)
Earlier arXiv preprint version
Archived snapshot (Wayback Machine) — preserved against link rot
Authors
Soorya Ram Shimgekar, Violeta J. Rodriguez, Paul A. Bloom, Dong Whi Yoo, Koustuv Saha
Tags
Cite This
APA
Soorya Ram Shimgekar et al. (2026). Suicidal Ideation in Online Spaces Through the Lens of Interpersonal Theory of Suicide: Exploratory Study of Self-Disclosure, Peer Support, and AI Responses. JMIR AI. https://ai.jmir.org/2026/1/e86265
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