Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2012, 9 4.6. Alcohol and Drugs 990 Alcohol abuse is known to be associated with an increased risk of suicidal behavior and suicide death among adolescents. A recent study reported that the link between heavy episodic drinking (HED) and suicide attempts is maintained even after controlling for depression [40]. The association was strongest in the under 13-year age group and decreased with increasing age. These findings suggest that early HED may be a marker for some other factor (e.g., poor behavioral inhibition, poor decision making, cognitive precociousness) causally related to suicide attempts [12]. Restricting alcohol sales to adolescents has already been shown to be an effective suicide-prevention measure [41,42]. 4.7. Bullying Klomek et al. [43] showed that bullying and victimization during childhood increase the odds of a subsequent suicide attempt [43]. However, Brent et al. [20] found that in boys, bullying, but not victimization, was associated with suicide, but the association was not causal; rather, both bullying and suicide were both consequences of conduct disorder, a known risk factor for suicidal behavior. By contrast, in girls, victimization, but not bullying, was associated with suicide attempts, even after adjusting for conduct disorder and depression [21]. Others reported that boys who were both bullies and victims of bullying had a higher likelihood of suicidal behavior than boys who were only victims [43]. In girls, victims of bullying were more likely to exhibit suicidal behaviors than those who were neither bullies nor victims [43]. Today, many youth are subject to cyber-bullying through e-mails, cell phone texting, and internet social sites, perpetrated by other adolescents or even adults [41]. These findings call for strenuous efforts by school authorities to prevent bullying and the formulation of interventions to minimize its deleterious effects, particularly regarding cyber-bullying. 4.8. Suicide Contagion Social learning may be an important factor in both familial and nonfamilial transmission of suicidal behaviors. The concept of suicide contagion is based on the infective disease model and assumes that a suicidal behavior by one person may facilitate the occurrence of subsequent, similar behaviors by others [44]. The process is implemented via imitation. Theories of imitation have been postulated to explain clustering of suicides and DSH behaviors. Studies conducted primarily in adolescents revealed that up to 5% of all suicides may be the result of suicide clustering and that exposure to DSH behaviors in family and friends was predictive of DSH and suicide ideation [44]. A large body of research in the last 10 years clearly demonstrated that extensive newspaper and television coverage of suicide is associated with a significant increase in the rate of suicide [45]. The magnitude of the increase is proportional to the amount, duration, and prominence of the media coverage. This phenomenon is termed the “Werther effect” after Goethe’s novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774), which was assumed to have triggered an increase in suicides after its release. As a result, the book was banned in many European countries. Today, the increasing popularity of the Internet as a source of information has raised concerns about the danger of sites that promote suicide and sites set up by strangers who form suicide pacts [46]. Further empirical research is needed to clarify their effects. By the same token, however, the media may also serve as an effective means for preventing suicide contagion.