The associations between suicides, economic conditions and social isolation: Insights from Spain

Suicide is among the main challenges that need to be addressed in developed countries. In this paper, we analyse suicides across the 17 Spanish regions over the period 2014-2019. More precisely, our objective is to re-study the determinants of suicides focusing on the latest economic expansion perio...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2023-07, Vol.18 (7), p.e0288234-e0288234
Main Authors: Blázquez-Fernández, Carla, Cantarero-Prieto, David
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Approximation
Biology and Life Sciences
Developed countries
Earth Sciences
Economic aspects
Economic conditions
Economics
Empirical analysis
Gender
Gender aspects
Gender differences
Hypotheses
Influence
Loneliness
Management
Medicine and Health Sciences
People and places
Psychological aspects
Public health
Self destructive behavior
Sex differences
Social interactions
Social isolation
Social Sciences
Socioeconomics
Spain
Suicide
Suicide prevention
Suicides & suicide attempts
Unemployment
Urbanization
Women
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Suicide is among the main challenges that need to be addressed in developed countries. In this paper, we analyse suicides across the 17 Spanish regions over the period 2014-2019. More precisely, our objective is to re-study the determinants of suicides focusing on the latest economic expansion period. We use count panel data models and sex stratification. A range of aggregate socioeconomic regional-level factors have been identified. Our empirical results show that: (1) a socioeconomic urban-rural suicide gaps exist; (2) there are significant gender differences, for the women a Mediterranean suicide pattern appears whereas unemployment levels have a significant importance for men, (3) social isolation factors, when significant, they show an (a priori) surprisingly positive result. We provide new highlights for suicide prevention in Spain. Precisely, it is highlighted that jointly policies by gender and attending to vulnerable groups are both necessary.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0288234