Is there a relationship between elderly suicide rates and educational attainment? A cross-national study

Abstract

Backgound: Suicides are associated with both high and low levels of intelligence and educational attainment in both individual-level and aggregate-level studies, but this has been rarely studied in the elderly. Methods: A cross-national study examining the relationship between elderly suicide rates (y-axis) and educational attainment (x-axis) was undertaken with the ‘a priori’ hypothesis that the relationship would be curvilinear and follow a U-shaped curve with the quadratic equation Y = A + BX + CX 2, where A, B and C are constants. Data on suicide rates for both sexes in the age-bands 65–74 years and 75+ years, and the Education Index (a proxy measure of educational attainment) were ascertained from the World Health Organisation and the United Nations websites, respectively. Results: The main finding was the predicted curvilinear relationship between suicide rates, in both sexes in both the elderly age-bands, and the Education Index fitting the quadratic equation Y = A + BX + CX 2. Conclusions: Given the cross-sectional study design, a causal relationship cannot be assumed. The impact of educational attainment on elderly suicide rates may occur through interaction with other factors, mediation of the effects of other factors, or by its effects being mediated by other factors, and require further study.