When the News of the World published pictures of Pete Doherty cutting himself, the Samaritans asked the BBC not to broadcast the scenes in its TV documentary on the singer. A spokeswoman for the charity said there is a lot of evidence that portrayals of self-harm can cause imitative behaviour: "In particular, teenagers can be influenced by programmes that feature celebrities or people they can relate to." Do young people agree that some teenagers would be tempted to copy harming behaviour by someone like Doherty? Talk about the reasons for it.
What other activities do the media portray that risk encouraging copycat behaviour? Are young people aware of anything that they or people they know do because they have seen it on TV or in the press?
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