Citation

Hsu CY, Chang SS, Gunnell D. J. Clin. Psychiatry 2020; 81(6): e13339.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, Physicians Postgraduate Press)

DOI

10.4088/JCP.20l13339

PMID

32936541

Abstract

Suicide rates are one of the key indicators used to monitor population mental health in the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The Lancet Commission on Global Mental Health1 and Sustainable Development Report 20192 recently proposed that subjective well-being (measured using a questionnaire-based measure of happiness) could be an additional indicator of mental health in the SDGs. However, the extent to which happiness taps into a different component of mental health compared to suicide is understudied at the population level. In one recent study, the association between suicide and happiness across communities in Hong Kong was largely explained by their close relationships with socioeconomic factors3; likewise, any association between national suicide rates and happiness could be due to shared socioeconomic influences on both of these measures. Furthermore, the suicide-happiness relationship may differ in countries with different levels of socioeconomic development.4 This study examined the cross-national relationship between countries' suicide rates and happiness levels...

Language: en