KEY POINTS:
The growing tendency of young women to act like young men is making them more likely to die of suicide, an expert warns.
Annette Beautrais, a world authority on suicide research in New Zealand, warned of concerning trends emerging in this country.
In NZ, suicide among young men, aged 15-24, has long been perceived as the biggest problem, but this had declined since the mid 1990s, said Ms Beautrais, of the Canterbury Suicide Project, marking World Suicide Prevention day yesterday.
At the same time, the rate of suicide among the same age group of women, though much lower than for young men, was not declining in the same way.
Ms Beautrais said young women were becoming more like young males "in terms of their drinking and their bingeing and their driving and inter-personal violent behaviour.
And it looks as though they may be becoming more like males in terms of the methods of suicide they use, which are more lethal."
