{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]],"date-time":"2026-06-02T05:07:22Z","timestamp":1780376842425,"version":"3.54.1"},"reference-count":17,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]],"date-time":"2026-06-02T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1780358400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Sociol."],"abstract":"<jats:p>Suicide becomes a sociological object through the communications that make it observable, recordable, reportable, and governable. This Perspective draws on Luhmann\u2019s social systems theory to analyse how suicide-related meanings are selected and stabilised across functionally differentiated subsystems. The argument treats suicide as a limit-case perturbation that is processed differently by health care, law, education, media, and platform governance. Clinical research remains indispensable for understanding vulnerability and intervention; the sociological question concerns how those realities are described, circulated, and institutionally acted upon. The paper foregrounds structural coupling as a central problem for prevention. Protective communication gains force when it is converted into interaction, institutional response, and continuity of care under capacity constraints. It concludes by outlining a research agenda focused on semantic distinctions, observability conditions, temporal windows, institutional bottlenecks, cross-system couplings, and governance as a modification of selection conditions.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3389\/fsoc.2026.1868606","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]],"date-time":"2026-06-02T04:28:15Z","timestamp":1780374495000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Why Luhmann? Social systems theory for a sociology of suicide in the platform age"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"11","author":[{"given":"Enrique","family":"Fern\u00e1ndez-Vilas","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Sociology and Social Work, University of Valladolid","place":["Valladolid, Spain"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Juan Jos\u00e9","family":"Labora-Gonz\u00e1lez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Political Science and Sociology, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela","place":["Santiago de Compostela, Spain"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Juan R.","family":"Coca","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Sociology and Social Work, University of Valladolid","place":["Valladolid, Spain"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref1","volume-title":"Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance","author":"Becker","year":"1963"},{"key":"ref2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"348","DOI":"10.1093\/ije\/dyw098","article-title":"Interrupted time series regression for the evaluation of public health interventions: a tutorial","volume":"46","author":"Bernal","year":"2017","journal-title":"Int. J. Epidemiol."},{"key":"ref3","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"236","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jaac.2019.04.020","article-title":"Association between the release of Netflix\u2019s 13 reasons why and suicide rates in the United States: an interrupted time series analysis","volume":"59","author":"Bridge","year":"2020","journal-title":"J. Am. Acad. Child Adolesc. Psychiatry"},{"key":"ref4","volume-title":"The Costs of Connection: How data is Colonizing human life and Appropriating it for Capitalism","author":"Couldry","year":"2019"},{"key":"ref5","volume-title":"Suicide: A Study in Sociology","author":"Durkheim","year":"1951"},{"key":"ref6","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1002\/sres.70073","article-title":"Modelling suicide-related communication dynamics: a socio-cybernetic framework for governance","author":"Fern\u00e1ndez-Vilas","year":"2026","journal-title":"Syst. Res. Behav. Sci."},{"key":"ref7","volume-title":"Custodians of the Internet: Platforms, content Moderation, and the hidden Decisions that Shape social media","author":"Gillespie","year":"2018"},{"key":"ref8","volume-title":"Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity","author":"Goffman","year":"1963"},{"key":"ref9","volume-title":"Social Systems","author":"Luhmann","year":"1995"},{"key":"ref10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","DOI":"10.1515\/9781503619227","volume-title":"The Reality of the mass media","author":"Luhmann","year":""},{"key":"ref11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","DOI":"10.4324\/9781315128665","volume-title":"Risk: A Sociological Theory","author":"Luhmann","year":""},{"key":"ref12","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"m575","DOI":"10.1136\/bmj.m575","article-title":"Association between suicide reporting in the media and suicide: systematic review and meta-analysis","volume":"368","author":"Niederkrotenthaler","year":"2020","journal-title":"BMJ"},{"key":"ref13","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"100922","DOI":"10.1016\/j.eclinm.2021.100922","article-title":"Systematic review and meta-analyses of suicidal outcomes following fictional portrayals of suicide and suicide attempt in entertainment media","volume":"36","author":"Niederkrotenthaler","year":"2021","journal-title":"EClinicalMedicine"},{"key":"ref14","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"340","DOI":"10.2307\/2094294","article-title":"The influence of suggestion on suicide: substantive and theoretical implications of the Werther effect","volume":"39","author":"Phillips","year":"1974","journal-title":"Am. Sociol. Rev."},{"key":"ref15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","DOI":"10.1093\/oso\/9780190889760.001.0001","volume-title":"The Platform Society: Public Values in a Connective World","author":"van Dijck","year":"2018"},{"key":"ref16","volume-title":"Preventing Suicide: A Resource for media Professionals","year":"2023"},{"key":"ref17","volume-title":"The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: the Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power","author":"Zuboff","year":"2019"}],"container-title":["Frontiers in Sociology"],"original-title":[],"link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.frontiersin.org\/articles\/10.3389\/fsoc.2026.1868606\/full","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]],"date-time":"2026-06-02T04:28:18Z","timestamp":1780374498000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.frontiersin.org\/articles\/10.3389\/fsoc.2026.1868606\/full"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]]},"references-count":17,"alternative-id":["10.3389\/fsoc.2026.1868606"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/fsoc.2026.1868606","relation":{},"ISSN":["2297-7775"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2297-7775","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]]},"article-number":"1868606"}}