A review of the causes, manifestations and panacea of incidences of suicide in Nigeria

Abstract

This paper focuses on the phenomenon of suicide ravaging Nigerian society. It specifically espouses the causes, manifestations, and feasible panacea to the scourge of suicide in the context of students in higher education in Nigeria. It adopted the content analysis methodology whereby existing secondary data on suicide were comprehensively reviewed and major strands and themes in the data analyzed were used as the basis for the discourse in this paper. The results of the reviewed data reveal that the major causal factors of the upsurge in suicide in Nigeria are attributed to a myriad of problems bedeviling Nigerian society such as; the comatose economy, abject poverty, anomie, globalization, get-rich-syndrome, peer influence, stress, and anxiety associated with socio-economic and political realities of the Nigerian society. These systemic and personal problems negatively impact the youths especially those in the higher institutions of learning because of the rigors associated with academic pursuits in Nigeria. A feasible panacea on how to stem the tide of suicide in Nigeria was discussed at the end of the paper.