PHYSICAL REVIEW E, vol.104, no.1, 2021 (SCI-Expanded)
We present an extensive Monte Carlo investigation of the metastable lifetime through the reversal of the magnetization of spin-s Ising and Blume-Capel models, where s = {1/2, 1, 3/2, 2, 5/2, 3, 7/2}. The mean metastable lifetime (or reversal time) is studied as a function of the applied magnetic field, and for both models it is found to obey the Becker-During theory, as was initially developed for the case of an s = 1/2 Ising ferromagnet within the classical nucleation theory. Moreover, the decay of the metastable volume fraction nicely follows Avrami's law for all values of s and for both models considered.