Sexual orientation tops suicide risk: Study

First year of college ideal time to screen for suicidal tendency

Belgium, March 17: Nearly one- third of first- year college students have thought of suicide, according to a study across eight countries. Non- heterosexual identity or feelings were the biggest risks for this kind of thinking or behaviour.

Having a religion other than Christianity, being female, having unmarried parents or at least one deceased parent and being age 20 or older were also important risk factors, though being a sexual minority also carried the highest risk of transitioning from suicidal thoughts ■

to plans to attempts, researchers found.

“It is important to realise... that the relative increase in risk is still modest,” said lead author the Philippe Mortier, a neuroscience researcher at Leuven University in Belgium. “Especially when we consider suicide attempts ( with a lifetime prevalence of 4.3 per cent), it is important to keep in mind that most students who struggle with sexual orientation issues will not develop serious suicidality,” he said by email.

These results do suggest, however, that the first year of college could be an ideal time to screen all entering students for suicide risk and intervene appropriately, the study team writes in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. “It is therefore important that future studies take into account a higher number of additional risk and protective factors to better differentiate which particular students in high- risk groups will go on and commit attempts and eventually suicide,” Mortier added.

The study team analysed data from the WHO World Mental Health Surveys International College Student Project, including responses from a total of 13,984 first- year college students at seven private and 12 public institutions in Australia, Belgium, Germany, Mexico, Northern Ireland, South Africa, Spain and the US.