Hi psyched_out,

I am waiting to be viva'd on a PhD investigating suicide by area in England and Wales, and my MSc dissertation a few years ago was investigating suicide method. My advice would be to seriously think about your subject before you approach universities in order to decide on a department. The subject area of suicide in men is huge in terms of the literature, so I would think about how you plan to approach this (methodology), and what aspect of suicide in men in particular you're interested in. My studies were in a social statistics department, where I fitted in due to the methodology used, and the subject matter was somewhat incidental. It may be that you could do something similar.

It's worth bearing in mind that it's likely that you may struggle to gain access to suicide data, as it is understandably very sensitive. You may be able to access the data through the Office for National Statistics (ONS), either by applying for Approved Researcher Status with them, or by using their published aggregate numbers. Another useful source of data is the National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People with Mental Illness (NCISH). They have allowed PhD researchers to access the data before, but are not an academic department and so do not run the PhDs. If you are planning to collect data yourself, you will have to do a lot of ethics! I used data from the ONS and NCISH, under strict confidentiality and data security guidelines.

I realise I may be repeating things you already know, but if not, then hopefully this can be of some help to start thinking about these things. I would suggest that if you have a clear plan (including methodology), you could fit in to any psychology, sociology or medical research department. It may be that you have to put in a bit more planning now in order to persuade them.

Hope this helps a little.