Abstract
Suicide is a public health problem and one of the leading causes of death in the United States. Research exploring the linkages between religion and spirituality has received intermittent attention. Data was derived from the Nashville Stress and Health Study (2011–2014), a cross-sectional probability survey of black and white adults from Davidson County, Tennessee (n = 1252). Results indicate that those with no perceived belief in divine control had a higher likelihood of suicidality. This study provides a fresh perspective on the links between religious factors and suicidality by (a) considering multiple religious and spiritual domains and (b) focusing on the association between irreligion and suicidality.
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Notes
The increase in the divine control coefficient after controlling for covariates, specifically race, warranted further investigation. Interactions with race were tested but none were significant. Still, the increase in the coefficient might be due to other factors. First, African Americans are less likely than their White counterparts to lack belief in divine control (see Schieman et al., 2005). They are also less prone than Whites to suicidality (see Bommersbach et al., 2022). Thus, race might partially suppress associations between (lack of) divine control and suicidality. We raise these implications again in the closing discussion.
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Funding
This research uses data from the Nashville Stress and Health Study, a project led by the late R. Jay Turner and funded by the National Institute on Aging (R01AG034067). Reed DeAngelis received support from the Duke Aging Center Postdoctoral Research Training Grant (NIA T32-AG000029), and the Population Research Infrastructure (P2C-HD050924) and Biosocial Training (T32-HD091058) programs awarded to the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
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KK and Dr. CE discussed the initial conception of the study. Dr. CD performed the analysis and drafted the relevant sections in the article. The theoretical and subsequent discussion sections were drafted by Dr. CE and Drs. CD and RDA provided comments and suggestions. All authors contributed, reviewed, provided critical input, and approved the final manuscript.
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Daniels, C.L., Ellison, C.G., DeAngelis, R.T. et al. Is Irreligion a Risk Factor for Suicidality? Findings from the Nashville Stress and Health Study. J Relig Health 62, 3801–3819 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-023-01906-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10943-023-01906-4