Structural topic modeling in studies of the relationship between financial debt and suicide

Suicide factors and ways to prevent it are in the constant attention focus of the international scientific community. Research interest covers various areas, not excluding the economy, since suicide entails serious economic losses since it is one of the causes of death among the working population. The aim of this work is to establish additional determinants of the relationship between suicide and financial debt using modern machine learning methods, the use of which makes it possible to more effectively analyze a significantly larger number of publications in a short time. The research method is Structural Topic Modeling. This method works well on short texts and allows the use of metadata. The information base consists of 3324 abstracts of scientific articles on relevant issues posted in the international Scopus database during 2015-2021. Articles were selected from various fields of knowledge: social sciences; medicine; arts and humanities; economics, econometrics and finance; psychology. The research was conducted in the RStudio package. Results: 1) the analysis of statistical data showed an increase in interest in the study of the connection between suicide and financial debt from 400 publications in 2015 to 600 in 2021; 2) based on three criteria - the quality of model prediction, exclusivity and semantic coherence - we formed 21 topics, which confirms both the high research interest in the problem and its versatility and complexity; 3) we confirmed the growing importance and relevance of research on such assumptions as the strengthening of the link between debt, suicide and economic crises; the importance of preserving traditional values; the need for special, including medical, attention in conditions of social restrictions; increased predisposition to suicide against the background of financial difficulties of certain social groups and professional communities. The results obtained can be implemented by researchers, including by using exclusive words in selected topics to search for literature of interest on the problems of the interdependence of suicide and financial debt.