Table V-7 shows college student and pathologist answers to three questions: how lethal they think various suicide methods are ("Lethality") as a percentage of attempts; how long they think it takes to die, ("Time") in minutes; and how painful they think the process is ("Agony"), on an arbitrary scale of 0 (painless) to100 (excruciating). Note that while the average student estimates were remarkably good, they had a much larger standard deviation (data not shown) than did the pathologists.

Independent estimates made by the students are compared to those by the pathologists. The rightmost column ("Real") shows actual percentage of fatalities, combining data from Card and Shneidman & Farberow (except drug fatalities, for which more recent data from New Zealand and Hawaii are used).

TABLE V-7

Perception of Lethality, Time, and Pain of Suicide Methods

Method	Dimension	College student rating	Pathologist rating	"Real" values
Carbon Monoxide	Lethality	78	71	77
	Time	79	22
	Agony	24	18
Drugs	---	--	--	3
Overdose/Rx drugs	Lethality	61	12
	Time	155	129
	Agony	28	8
OD/non-Rx drugs	Lethality	47	6
	Time	209	456
	Agony	30	22
OD/illegal drugs	Lethality	76	49
	Time	90	116
	Agony	44	5
Household toxins	Lethality	72	78
	Time	106	24
	Agony	79	54
Cyanide	Lethality	91	97
	Time	37	2
	Agony	65	52
Guns, all	---	--	--	85
Gunshot to head	Lethality	85	97	89
	Time	10	2
	Agony	65	13
Gunshot to chest	Lethality	75	90
	Time	64	7
	Agony	82	22
Gunshot to abdomen	Lethality	64	65
	Time	176	69
	Agony	88	74
Shotgun to head	Lethality	91	99
	Time	31	2
	Agony	70	6
Shotgun to chest	Lethality	77	96
	Time	50	1
	Agony	75	16
Explosives	Lethality	80	96
	Time	32	2
	Agony	79	4
Electrocution	Lethality	72	66
	Time	16	2
	Agony	85	72
Set fire to self	Lethality	73	76	35
	Time	42	57
	Agony	95	95
Structure fire	Lethality	54	73
	Time	95	52
	Agony	87	92
Cut/stab (all)	---	--	--	5
Cut throat	Lethality	74	52
	Time	38	16
	Agony	80	86
Cut limbs	Lethality	44	6
	Time	103	105
	Agony	75	71
Stab of chest	Lethality	62	58
	Time	97	96
	Agony	84	76
Stab of abdomen	Lethality	53	12
	Time	99	252
	Agony	86	78
Auto crash	Lethality	58	78
	Time	120	20
	Agony	75	30
Jump from height	Lethality	80	93	42
	Time	32	5
	Agony	62	18
Hit by train	Lethality	98	96
	Time	9	18
	Agony	79	7
Hit by truck/auto	Lethality	74	70
	Time	48	19
	Agony	81	63
Hanging	Lethality	84	90	78
	Time	10	7
	Agony	66	26
Plastic bag Lethality 66	23	55
	Time	10	7
	Agony	56	23
Drowning	---	--	--	75
Drowning/ocean/lake	Lethality	72	63
	Time	10	18
	Agony	61	79
Drowning/bathtub	Lethality	55	22
	Time	10	18
	Agony	59	79
Drowning/swimpool	Lethality	63	22
	Time	18	18
	Agony	57	79

[source: Rhyne, et al, "Dimensions of suicide: perceptions of lethality, time, and agony." Suicide & Life Threatening Behavior 25(3), 1995 pp 373-80.]