PMID- 15742221
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20050519
LR  - 20221207
IS  - 0933-7954 (Print)
IS  - 0933-7954 (Linking)
VI  - 40
IP  - 3
DP  - 2005 Mar
TI  - Social environment factors associated with suicide attempt among low-income 
      African Americans: the protective role of family relationships and social 
      support.
PG  - 175-85
AB  - BACKGROUND: Suicide and suicide attempts are important public health concerns, 
      and recent decades have witnessed a rising rate of suicide among African 
      Americans. A history of prior attempts is a leading risk factor for completed 
      suicide. Further research is needed into the social environment risk factors for 
      suicide attempt among African Americans. This study focused on two important 
      dimensions of the social environment, family relationships and social support, as 
      well as an important person-level risk factor--depressive symptoms. METHOD: Data 
      were obtained from a case-control study of 200 African American men and women 
      aged 18-64 years, who sought services at a large, urban, public hospital. Odds 
      ratios adjusted for significant sociodemographic differences between groups 
      (aORs) were calculated for environment risk factors for suicide attempt among the 
      cases and controls. The role of depressive symptoms was also studied. RESULTS: 
      Lower levels of family adaptability and family cohesion increased the relative 
      rate of suicide attempt in the sample. The aOR associated with the lowest 
      quartile of family adaptability was 3.90, and the aORs associated with the first 
      and second quartiles of family cohesion were 8.91 and 5.51, respectively. Lower 
      levels of social embeddedness and social support increased the relative rate of 
      suicide attempt in our sample. The aOR associated with the first and second 
      quartiles of social embeddedness were 5.67 and 4.93, respectively, and the aOR 
      associated with the lowest quartile of social support was 6.29. A mediating role 
      of depression was discovered when depressive symptoms were entered into the 
      logistic regression models. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings indicate that social 
      environment factors including deficits in family functioning and social support 
      are associated strongly with suicide attempts among low-income African American 
      men and women seeking treatment in a large, urban hospital. Thus, better family 
      functioning and social supports can be considered protective factors in this 
      population. The presence of depressive symptoms, a well-known risk factor for 
      suicide attempts and suicide, appears to mediate the association between social 
      environment factors and suicide attempt.
FAU - Compton, Michael T
AU  - Compton MT
AD  - Emory University School of Medicine, Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, 
      Atlanta GA 30303, USA. mcompto@emory.edu
FAU - Thompson, Nancy J
AU  - Thompson NJ
FAU - Kaslow, Nadine J
AU  - Kaslow NJ
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.
PL  - Germany
TA  - Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol
JT  - Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology
JID - 8804358
SB  - IM
MH  - Adolescent
MH  - Adult
MH  - Black or African American/*psychology/*statistics & numerical data
MH  - Family/*psychology
MH  - Family Relations
MH  - Female
MH  - Humans
MH  - Male
MH  - Middle Aged
MH  - Psychological Theory
MH  - *Social Environment
MH  - *Social Support
MH  - Socioeconomic Factors
MH  - Suicide, Attempted/*ethnology/*psychology
MH  - Surveys and Questionnaires
MH  - United States/epidemiology
EDAT- 2005/03/03 09:00
MHDA- 2005/05/20 09:00
CRDT- 2005/03/03 09:00
PHST- 2004/08/25 00:00 [accepted]
PHST- 2005/03/03 09:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2005/05/20 09:00 [medline]
PHST- 2005/03/03 09:00 [entrez]
AID - 10.1007/s00127-005-0865-6 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. 2005 Mar;40(3):175-85. doi: 
      10.1007/s00127-005-0865-6.