Understanding psychosocial factors leading to suicide attempts

Abstract

The objectives of the study were: 1. to explore the psychological factors leading to suicide attempts, 2. to explore Social Factors Leading to Suicide Attempts and 3. to understand the interplay of psychological and social factors leading to suicide attempts. In this study, Qualitative exploratory research method was used where purposive sampling method was employed to collect data from eight adult participants - six females and two males - who experienced suicide attempts. The age range of the subjects was 16-43 years and their average age was 28 years. By following a topical guide the participants were guided to share their experiences of suicide attempts which were digitally recorded through in-depth interview. The interviews were then transcribed and analyzed using open coding followed by extracting themes and subthemes. Results of the analysis yielded seven major themes. Two of them are psychological and the rest are social factors which substantiate the first and second specific objectives of the study respectively. The psychological major theme incorporates vulnerable-self and blind-self. Most of them had strong negative self-appraisal, profound hopelessness and worthlessness. The major social themes are pathological family, detrimental relationships, uneven upbringing, obstructive community and instigating event. Most of them were caused by physical, verbal and emotional abuse in their family. The third objective of this study has been met by the third major findings of this study which is the interplay of social and psychological factors leading to suicide attempts. The study findings indicate that social and psychological factors might have made a vulnerable-self inside the participants. The collective sense of self is full of worthlessness; there is a sense of being ruined, crushed, humiliated, rejected, neglected, and tortured, a feeling of sinfulness and being used. These might have made the person most vulnerable to suicide. At that vulnerable condition, the participant had to expose the instigating event which occurred just before suicide attempt. They had blind-self comprised of narrow vision and terminal impulse to do die and finally attempted suicide. In comparison with some other existing model, it was found that there were some similarities with psychosocial model. It may be concluded that interplay of psychological and social factors played a significant role in suicide attempts. This may be used in clinical practice and suicide prevention programs.