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Effects of Church Attendance Vs. Private Religious Activities on Suicidal Ideation: A Study of Rural US College Students

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Abstract

To examine how religiosity and depression directly/indirectly affect suicidal ideation in White and African American rural college students. The data from 272 rural college students were used to test the moderated mediation model using PROCESS macro. Students with higher church attendance and/or private religious activities had lower depressive symptoms, which in turn significantly alleviated their suicidal ideation. There was no significant racial group difference in the direct/indirect effects. The college students who did not engage in religious meetings and private religious activities were inclined to have depressive symptoms and a higher risk of suicidal ideation.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank School of Applied Sciences and Department of Social Work of the University of Mississippi for funding (SAS RS1000). This research was conducted under a research project entitled Mississippi Student Success.

Funding

This research was funded by the School of Applied Sciences (SAS RS1000) at the University of Mississippi. The funder had no role in study design, data collection, and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social Work, University of Mississippi, University, MS, 38677, USA

    Yi Jin Kim

  2. School of Social Work, The University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, 76019, USA

    Jandel Crutchfield

  3. School of Social Work, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, 70802, USA

    Youn Kyoung Kim

Authors
  1. Yi Jin Kim
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  2. Jandel Crutchfield
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  3. Youn Kyoung Kim
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Contributions

Yi Jin Kim contributed to conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, funding acquisition, investigation, methodology, project administration, resources, software, supervision, validation, visualization, writing (original draft), writing (review & editing); Jandel Crutchfield contributed to supervision, writing (original draft), writing (review & editing); Youn Kyoung Kim contributed to writing (original draft), writing (review & editing).

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Correspondence to Yi Jin Kim.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Approval was obtained from the ethics committee of the University of Mississippi. The procedures used in this study adhere to the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Kim, Y.J., Crutchfield, J. & Kim, Y.K. Effects of Church Attendance Vs. Private Religious Activities on Suicidal Ideation: A Study of Rural US College Students. J Relig Health 60, 2560–2572 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-021-01224-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-021-01224-7

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