The Japanese: Any way you slice it, mental illness abounds.

“For the purposes of this chapter we would like to introduce a few common concepts related to the Japanese concept of the unconscious. First is that there is an overwhelming and intense desire for the establishment of an identity by belongingness to a group (Berger, 1985; Christopher, 1983; Doi, 1973; Sugiyama-Lebra, 1976; Takahashi, 1992). A sense of oneness "ittaikan" is generated unconsciously with the group and there is a social sensitivity to any possible disruptions in the harmony of this relationship. Ostracism from the group is to be avoided at all costs. Pressures to conform to a limited pattern of behavior and thought and an expectation for a total commitment to the group accompany this.

A consequence of this is that both the pride and shame of an individual are shared by the group and vice-versa. Shame, conscious and unconscious, is thus quite powerful and is often an important factor in suicide in Japan. Guilt is involved in relationships of reciprocity where a favor "on" is accompanied by the burden of the duty of reciprocity "giri" which may be very intense and emotionally uncomfortable (this is in contrast to the western sense of guilt that stems from an internal sense that one has done something wrong). This sense of a never ending "owing" is quite pervasive in the unconscious of the Japanese especially in relation to those who have taken care of oneself.

This paper will discuss some of the culturally-related dynamics and unconscious processes related suicide in Japan. We will present two exemplary kinds of suicide peculiar to Japanese context, "shinju" and "inseki jisatsu."

SHINJU

The word shinju in Japanese, originally meant a mutual suicide agreement by lovers in order to prove the genuineness of their love to each other. According to the strict and original definition described by Ohara (1985), shinju is an act where more than two people commit suicide voluntarily at the same place, at the same time, and for the same purpose. The definition has become looser and now also includes murder-suicides where some of those involved are killed against their will (Fukushima, 1984). The definition of shinju now includes both a genuine suicide pact, extended suicide (assisted suicide followed by suicide), and murder-suicide in which the killer and the victim(s) have a strong emotional tie with each other before the act. The feeling of "oneness" of those involved in shinju is important.

Shinju literally means "heart-inside" or "oneness of hearts" (Walsh, 1969) and this probably reflects a psychological joining of the participants. The participants may likely have a conscious awareness of wanting to join or unite with their partner in the afterlife, but unconsciously there may be a wish for infantile symbiosis and an intolerance of separation anxiety. The development of clear ego boundaries is probably impaired in these individuals though state-related regressions may also be at play in some individuals. Uniting with their suicide partner may be a reaction for failure to fit into society or a group.

The Japanese language has diverse words for shinju. Shinju has been classified into two major categories, johshi (mutually consented lovers' suicide) and oyako-shinju (parent-child suicide), the latter of which is subclassified further such as boshi-shinju (mother-child suicide), fushi-shinju (father-child suicide), and ikka-shinju (family suicide). The number of johshi have been declining in the past three decades. Although the number of oyako-shinju has been declining since the 1950s as well, it is still a serious problem.

Most cases of shinju are boshi-shinju in which the children, who are too young to decide on suicide themselves, are killed by their mothers. Ohara and Inamura have both pointed out that boshi-shinju and fushi-shinju have important differences (Ohara, 1963, 1965; Inamura, 1977, 1993). In boshi-shinju mothers in their 20s and 30s kill their children and then commit suicide. The children most often victimized in boshi-shinju are of preschool age. In fushi-shinju the fathers (who are usually older than the boshi-shinju mothers) kill their children (who are older than the victims of boshi-shinju), and then commit suicide. The most common reasons for boshi-shinju are psychiatric disorders and family conflicts, while those of fushi-shinju are financial problems and physical illness. Japanese often show considerable sympathy toward parents who are not able to find any other recourse but to commit suicide with her/his children.

Japanese society as a whole fosters a mutual interdependency in the socialization process and this is quite a contrast to the emphasis placed in individuality put in the west (Christopher, 1983). In order to promote this mutual dependency there is probably some unconscious muting of the separation-individuation process on the part of caregivers as described by Margaret Mahler (1972). As a consequence, the boundaries, both conscious and unconscious, in ones nuclear family can be more blurred than in western society and this may have lead to the development of shinju as a Japanese cultural phenomena.

Why then, is infanticide committed by the mother relatively common in Japan? 

Paradoxically, it is this very bond between mother and child that causes oyako-shinju. According to Japanese logic, the suicidal mother cannot bear to leave the child to survive alone; she would rather kill the child because she believes that nobody else in the world would take care of the child better than she, and that the child would be better off dying with her.

In this situation, murdering one's children can be unconsciously regarded as murdering a part of oneself. The mother may not necessarily realize that she is killing another human being separate from herself, but unconsciously rather feels as though she is killing a part of herself. In the psychology of the mother who commits boshi-shinju, killing her own children is equivalent to actually killing herself, and this is interpreted as a kind of "extended suicide". It is impossible for her to imagine a world for her children after her death. Japanese society is often sympathetic to this dynamic. 

In addition, Japanese have a general reluctance to criticize each other which may be related to a filial piety to the group. However, we should also note the proverb "Shinu kiga areba nandemo dekiru" which means "If one has a will to die, one could do anything." The existence of this proverb probably reflects Japanese society's ambivalence to shinju, both praising and demanding suicide in the same proverb.

It is believed that children cannot or should not be left alone in the world where parent(s) have killed themselves. The children are killed before the parent commits suicide, because they are loved deeply.

INSEKI-JISATSU

Throughout the history of Japan, there has been almost no period when suicide was prohibited by law. The exception was in the early 18th century when a cluster of joshi suicides (lovers' suicide pact) was triggered by melodramas written by Chikamatsu Monzaemon. The government prohibited johshi in order to prevent these suicides. If a joshi occurred, a funeral was prohibited, and the bodies were left in the public view at Nihonbashi Bridge for three days. If one died and the other survived, the survivor was convicted of murder.

The most widely known form of suicide outside of Japan is harakiri, or seppuku, which means suicide by stabbing one's abdomen. Harakiri was the ritual form of suicide practiced by feudal warriors to show that they accepted responsibility for their actions (Fus・ 1985), and had its beginnings about 1,000 years ago. Japanese warriors used to respect the abdomen because it was considered to be the seat of the soul, so when they assumed responsibility for some serious action or course of conduct, they would cut open their abdomen to demonstrate their innocence and bravery. Cutting one's abdomen itself was not a very effective way to kill oneself so that in the ritual another person severed their neck.

Since the late 19th century when the Edo era ended, harakiri has rarely been practiced either as a form of suicide or as a punishment. The harakiri suicide of the famous Japanese novelist Yukio Mishima in 1970 was an extremely exceptional case, and astonished even the Japanese.

While contemporary Japanese do not commit suicide by harakiri, inseki-jisatsu is a form of suicide sometimes regarded as a way of taking responsibility. Inseki means taking responsibility and jisatsu means suicide in Japanese. Toyomasa Fuso, a sociologist and suicidologist, has been conducting suicide research from a cross-cultural perspective and suggested that suicide often takes place when political or social scandals occur in Japan.

The Japanese individual will feel an intense indebtedness to their group, and as noted above their unconscious need to relieve this burden can result in their taking responsibility as a way to prevent ostracism from the group. This can be seen in everyday life where workers may work late into the night for fear that their coworkers would resent them if they left earlier than the group as a whole. While superficially it seems that the individual is sacrificing for the group it is actually the unconscious and preconscious needs of the individual to maintain group acceptance that is expressed in manifest self-sacrifice.

The mass media in Japan has not recently reported suicide cases in an exaggerated fashion. This does not hold, however, for cluster suicides in young people or for suicides of those involved in political scandals. The mass media report such cases repeatedly and sensationally. While only the facts are briefly reported for ordinary suicides, great details of the behavior before the suicide and the methods of the suicide are often reported for inseki-jisatsu. They usually do not touch upon the psychiatric problems that might have existed in those killing themselves. There is also a trend for the suicide to be reported as a way of taking responsibility for some wrong doing.

Often, someone who has important information about the facts of the situation commits suicide and leaves a note saying something like "I did nothing wrong. However, I have caused a great deal of trouble to my organization. Therefore, for this I will take responsibility by committing suicide." De Vos (1968) called exaggerated self-identification to a role given by others or an organization to which an individual belongs, "role narcissism." De Vos pointed out that suicide may take place because unconscious identification to a group (or its leader) is so strong that it becomes almost impossible to imagine dissolution of the group.”