Predictive Model of Suicide Risk in Young People: The Mediating Role of Alcohol Consumption

Abstract

Suicidal behavior is one of the public health problems that cause most deaths in young people and has been associated with emotional and affective problems, so predictive models are required to account for the relationship between depression, anxiety, hopelessness, and alcohol consumption to propose actions for its prevention. The Plutchik Suicide Risk Scale, the CAGE Questionnaire, the Hopelessness Scale, the Depression Inventory and the Beck Anxiety Scale were applied. A total of 1.379 young people (M = 20.45; SD = 3.23) from the cities of Manizales (n = 739; 53.6%) and Medellín (n = 640; 46.5%) in Colombia were evaluated. The variables of anxiety, hopelessness and depression explained 51% (R² = 0.509; 95% CI = 0.467–0.552; p = 0.001) of the variation in suicidal risk. Likewise, alcohol consumption is a mediating variable between depression and anxiety in the prediction of suicidal risk, whose total, direct and indirect effects are statistically significant. The findings support the role of alcohol consumption as a mediating variable between anxiety, depression, hopelessness and suicidal risk in young people, given the difficulties it causes in information processing, regulation of emotions and therefore in having an adequate coping with the demands of the environment. This justifies the importance of directing suicide prevention actions through strategies for the reduction of alcohol consumption and the management of emotions in young people.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Alcohol modulates the effect of depression and anxiety on suicide risk

• This is a study on the risk of suicide in young people in Colombia

• The findings have implications for timely clinical interventions.

Keywords:

• Alcohol consumption anxiety
• depression
• suicide

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Special thanks to the study participants for their collaboration in completing the instruments that made it possible to obtain information on the research variables.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

AUTHOR NOTES

César Núñez, Psychology Program, Universidad de Medellín, Carrera 87 30-65, Medellín 050526, Colombia.

Anyerson Stiths Gómez Tabares, Psychology Program, Universidad Católica Luis Amigó, Medellín, Colombia.

Jaime Humberto Moreno Méndez, Psychology Program, Universidad Católica de Colombia, Bogotá 110231, Colombia

María Paula Agudelo Osorio, Psychology Program, Universidad de Medellín, Medellín, Colombia.

Vicente E. Caballo, Faculty of Psychology, Campus de Cartuja, Universidad de Granada, 18071 Granada (Spain).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Universidad Católica Luis Amigó [Grant number 0502020126]; Universidad de Medellín, [Grant number 50260251]; and Universidad Católica de Colombia, [Grant number 4110043].