Gender and attitude in suicide posts on <i>Cairo Confessions</i> : a corpus-based study

Abstract Individuals with suicidal ideation often turn to virtual communities such as Cairo Confessions (CC), an Egyptian-founded Facebook group, to anonymously share their emotions and thoughts. Suicide posts on CC constitute a rich source of emotional and evaluative content. This study investigates the gendered expression of the three dimensions of Attitude – AFFECT, JUDGMENT, and APPRECIATION – as well as the articulation of suicidal ideation. The theoretical framework integrates Martin and White’s (2005. The language of evaluation: Appraisal in English . Palgrave Macmillan) Appraisal Model with Daouk et al.’s (2023. Suicidality in the Arab world: Results from an Online Screener. Community Mental Health Journal 59. 1401–1408) psychological scaling of suicidality. Data comprises 130 suicide posts, totaling 22,850 words, published between 2018 and 2024 on CC. This corpus is divided into male and female sub-corpora based on the authors’ self-declared gender. Findings reveal distinct gender differences in various aspects of Attitude expression and suicidal ideation. Nonetheless, across both genders, the discourse predominantly reflects negative over positive Attitudes, marked increases in negative Affect, a higher prevalence of suicidal thoughts compared to reports of actual suicide attempts, and frequent use of first-person pronouns. This creates a discourse that is emotionally intense, dark in tone, and highly self-focused. The study addresses a critical public health issue – suicide – in a culturally specific context, thereby filling a research gap concerning non-Western populations.