TY - JOUR
PY - 2006//
TI - Socio-economic and psychological correlates of suicidality among Hong Kong working-age adults: results from a population-based survey
JO - Psychological medicine
A1 - Liu, Ka-Yuet
A1 - Chen, Eunice Y.
A1 - Chan, Chien-Lung
A1 - Lee, Dominic T. S.
A1 - Law, Yik-wa
A1 - Conwell, Yeates
A1 - Yip, Paul S. F.
SP - 1759
EP - 1767
VL - 36
IS - 12
N2 - Background. The global toll of suicide is estimated to be one million lives per year, which exceeded the number of deaths by homicide and war combined. A key step to suicide prevention is to prevent less serious suicidal behaviour to preclude more lethal outcomes. Although 61% of the world's suicides take place in Asia and the suicide rates among middle age groups have been increasing since the economic crisis in many Asian countries, population-based studies of suicidal behaviour among working-age adults in non-western communities are scarce.Method. Data from a population-based survey with 2015 participants were used to estimate the prevalence of suicidal ideation and behaviour among the working-age population in Hong Kong, and to study the associated socio-economic and psychological correlates. We focused particularly on potential modulating factors between life-event-related factors and suicidal ideation.Results. Six per cent of the Hong Kong population aged 20-59 years considered suicide in the past year, while 1.4% attempted suicide. Hopelessness, reasons for living, and reluctance to seek help from family and friends had direct association with past-year suicidal ideation. Reasons for living were found to moderate the effect of perceived stress on suicidal ideation.Conclusions. Suicidality is a multi-faceted problem that calls for a multi-sectored, multi-layered approach to prevention. Prevention programmes can work on modulating factors such as reasons for living to reduce suicidal risk in working-age adults. Language: en
LA - en
SN - 0033-2917
UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0033291706009032
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