Suicidal Ideation among the Chinese Elderly and Its Correlates: A Comparison between the Rural and Urban Populations

Jianwen Wei, Jie Zhang, Yuping Deng, Long Sun and Ping Guo
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Jianwen Wei: School of Sociology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
Jie Zhang: Central University of Finance and Economics School of Social Development, Beijing 100081, China
Yuping Deng: Central University of Finance and Economics School of Social Development, Beijing 100081, China
Long Sun: Shandong University School of Public Health Center for Suicide Prevention Research, Jinan 250012, China
Ping Guo: China Research Center on Aging, Beijing 100054, China

IJERPH, 2018, vol. 15, issue 3, 1-10

Abstract: Background: As China is going through a profound aging process, the mental health of the elderly is becoming an issue. As in many other societies, the elderly in China is a population at high risk of suicide; Methods: Data for the study were taken from the Sample Survey of the Aged Population in Urban/Rural China (SSAPUR) accomplished in 2010 by the China Ministry of Civil Affairs. The valid sample for this study was composed of 18,683 individuals, including 9416 urban residents and 9267 rural residents both aged 60 or more years; Results: Logistic regression analyses showed that household income and expenditure, the number of children, chronic diseases, disability of daily living, depression, the frequency of visiting neighbors and having friends or relatives who can help or not had remarkable effects on the suicidal ideation among urban and rural old people. Gender, education, political affiliation, marital status and self-rated health status did not work on the dependent variable. However, some risk factors for suicidal ideation among the Chinese elderly were different between rural and urban regions; Conclusions: We should take different measures when facing the different groups of the elderly.

Keywords: the Chinese elderly; depression; suicidal ideation; risk factors; urban-rural comparison (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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