What Are Reasons for the Large Gender Differences in the Lethality of Suicidal Acts? An Epidemiological Analysis in Four European Countries

Roland Mergl, Nicole Koburger, Katherina Heinrichs, András Székely, Mónika Ditta Tóth, James Coyne, Sónia Quintão, Ella Arensman, Claire Coffey, Margaret Maxwell, Airi Värnik, Chantal van Audenhove, David McDaid, Marco Sarchiapone, Armin Schmidtke, Axel Genz, Ricardo Gusmão and Ulrich Hegerl

PLOS ONE, 2015, vol. 10, issue 7, 1-18

Abstract: Background: In Europe, men have lower rates of attempted suicide compared to women and at the same time a higher rate of completed suicides, indicating major gender differences in lethality of suicidal behaviour. The aim of this study was to analyse the extent to which these gender differences in lethality can be explained by factors such as choice of more lethal methods or lethality differences within the same suicide method or age. In addition, we explored gender differences in the intentionality of suicide attempts. Methods and Findings: Methods. Design: Epidemiological study using a combination of self-report and official data. Setting: Mental health care services in four European countries: Germany, Hungary, Ireland, and Portugal. Data basis: Completed suicides derived from official statistics for each country (767 acts, 74.4% male) and assessed suicide attempts excluding habitual intentional self-harm (8,175 acts, 43.2% male). Findings Main Results: Suicidal acts (fatal and non-fatal) were 3.4 times more lethal in men than in women (lethality 13.91% (regarding 4106 suicidal acts) versus 4.05% (regarding 4836 suicidal acts)), the difference being significant for the methods hanging, jumping, moving objects, sharp objects and poisoning by substances other than drugs. Median age at time of suicidal behaviour (35–44 years) did not differ between males and females. The overall gender difference in lethality of suicidal behaviour was explained by males choosing more lethal suicide methods (odds ratio (OR) = 2.03; 95% CI = 1.65 to 2.50; p

Date: 2015
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0129062 (text/html)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id= ... 29062&type=printable (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pone00:0129062

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0129062

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in PLOS ONE from Public Library of Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by plosone ().