Abstract
Purpose: Suicide is the second leading cause of death among high school aged students in the United States. Significant risk factors for suicidal behaviors among youth include diagnoses of depression or other mental illnesses. The association between self-reported sad feelings and suicidal behaviors has been understudied in the literature among United States high school students.Methods: The 2019 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) school-based questionnaire, coordinated by the CDC, captured a nationally-representative sample (N = 13,677) of students' responses to health-related behaviors. National sex-stratified prevalences of sad feelings and suicidal behaviors were calculated. Adjusted weighted logistic regression was used to examine the association between self-reported sad feelings and suicidal behaviors.Results: Out of 13,677 high-school students, 35.8% of students self-reported sad feelings. Suicidal behaviors in the overall sample included 18.2% had seriously considered suicide, 15.2% made a plan on how they would attempt suicide, and 7.3% attempted suicide within the past 12 months. There was an 8–11-fold increased odds of all suicidal behaviors among those who reported sad feelings among both females and males.Conclusions: This study reveals a remarkably high prevalence of sad feelings among US youth, and underscores a significant association between self-reported sad feelings and suicidal behaviors among this population. The YRBS survey, routinely administered across US high school students, should be better leveraged to target interventions toward these high-risk youth in order to decrease the significant burden of suicidal behaviors among adolescents.
Highlights
Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States, responsible for over 48,000 deaths annually [1, 2]
Suicide mortality is concerning among teenagers and young adults in the United States, with 6,211 deaths in 2018 among individuals 15–24 years of age, making it the second leading cause of death in this age group [2]
This study utilizes data from the 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS) survey data, a nationallyrepresentative survey coordinated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to monitor healthrelated behaviors of middle and high school students in the United States [10]
Summary
Suicide is the tenth leading cause of death in the United States, responsible for over 48,000 deaths annually [1, 2]. Suicide mortality is concerning among teenagers and young adults in the United States, with 6,211 deaths in 2018 among individuals 15–24 years of age, making it the second leading cause of death in this age group [2]. The 2019 Center for Disease Control’s Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) showed a prevalence of suicide ideation among high school students of 18.8%, and increase from 17.2% in 2017 [4]. The prevalence of attempted suicide among high school students was 8.9%, an increase from 7.4% in 2017 [4]. Increased prevalence of suicide ideation and attempts was noted among individuals reporting female sex, American Indian/Alaska Native, Black/African American or Mixed race, and gay/lesbian/bisexual orientation [4]
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