He told FMT the large media coverage of celebrity suicides could make some youths vulnerable to thoughts of killing themselves.
He said research had suggested that celebrity cases could stimulate a rise in the suicide rate among specific gender and age groups within the first four weeks of the event.
Nonetheless, he added, this was not a major factor in teenage suicides.
“In my 25 years of psychiatry experience, I have found that the most common causes of suicide among teens are unrealistic parental expectations, relationship issues, poor mental health, substance abuse and social deprivation.
“Movies and Korean dramas have never featured significantly,” he said.
Recently, Senator Mohd Apandi Mohamad of PAS drew brickbats for claiming that films and Korean TV dramas were partly to blame for the large number of suicides among teenagers. He said Malaysian teens were too much influenced by these shows.
George, who heads the psychiatry department at the International Medical University (IMU), said suicide was the second leading cause of death among people aged 15 to 24 in the Asia Pacific.
He said teenagers’ blind devotion to celebrities usually signalled serious mental health problems left unaddressed by people around them.
He added that the physical, mental and emotional stresses of adolescence could be worsened by bullying, poor academic performance and such events as the divorce of parents or relocation to another town.
“So, instead of banning movies, we should perhaps focus on building better mental health resilience among our youths, as well as improving parenting and incorporating mental health skills in the school curriculum,” he added.
Malaysian Mental Health Association president Dr Andrew Mohanraj said suicide could be romanticised as a sensible and painless way of ending misery if it were so portrayed by a character played by a popular actor.
He told FMT this could lead to copycat suicides, but he said there were many other factors triggering suicidal tendencies among teenagers.
“Teens who are at risk of suicide are those who are victims of bullying or are under academic pressure or facing unrealistic expectations from parents and have mental disorders or substance use problems.”
Mohanraj said broadcasting agencies should add warning messages to their programmes as a form of suicide prevention.
Films and TV dramas should become agents of change in raising awareness in their audiences, he added.
George said mental illnesses had been portrayed negatively in the past, often causing stereotyping and stigmatisation.
However, he also said there had been many films, such as “A Beautiful Mind” and “Silver Linings Playbook”, that had broken down some of the stigma and stereotypes.
George commended Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka and Olympic gold medal-winning gymnast Simone Biles of the United States for stepping out to speak of their mental health struggles.
“Their disclosures have increased mental health literacy and reduced the stigma in seeking professional help,” he said.