Where Are They Now?
A psychiatrist tracked 515 people stopped from jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge and discovered that 94% were still alive — reshaping how the world understands suicide.
Dietmar Rabich / CC BY-SA 4.0
Suicidal behavior is crisis-oriented and time-limited. The impulse to destroy oneself does not last.
— Richard H. Seiden
Dr. Richard H. Seiden’s 1978 Study on Suicide Prevention at the Golden Gate Bridge
Dr. Richard H. Seiden’s groundbreaking 1978 study, ‘Where Are They Now?’, fundamentally altered the discourse on suicide prevention at the Golden Gate Bridge.
What happened: In 1978, Dr. Richard H. Seiden published a pivotal study in the journal Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, tracking every person who had been physically restrained from jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge between 1937 and 1971. His research revealed that the vast majority of these individuals did not go on to die by suicide, challenging the common belief that suicidal individuals would simply find another method. 1
Why it matters: Seiden’s findings were instrumental in shifting public opinion and policy regarding suicide prevention measures at the Golden Gate Bridge. His work demonstrated that intervention can be effective and significantly reduced the perceived inevitability of suicide among those who attempt it. This study became one of the most cited arguments for the installation of suicide barriers on the bridge, which was finally completed in January 2024. 2
Further reading:
Why This Mattered
Dr. Richard Seiden's landmark study tracked every person physically restrained from jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge between 1937 and 1971. His finding that the overwhelming majority never went on to die by suicide demolished the prevailing belief that suicidal people will 'just find another way,' and became one of the most cited arguments for barrier construction worldwide.
Further Reading
- Richard H. Seiden — Where Are They Now? A Follow-up Study of Suicide Attempters from the Golden Gate Bridge
- Seiden, R. H. (1978). Where Are They Now? Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, 8(4)
- An early warning system for multivariate time series with sparse and non-uniform sampling (arXiv)
- Where Are They Now (Open Library)
