Extended suicidological characteristics of youth and girls who have previously attempted suicide

According to official WHO statistics in 2015 the number of suicides among young people aged 20-24 in the world reached 83,692, compared with teenagers aged 15-19 the percentage is higher by 34.1% (55,228) and by 2% compared to the age group of 25-29. According to 2019 Rosstat data in the Russian Federation, 17,192 people died by suicide, of whom 14,299 were men and 2,893 were women. The article is devoted to the issue of auto-aggressive behavior in a group of young people from a relatively well-off social stratum of society who have a history of suicide attempt. The aim of this study is to study the behavioral characteristics of young parasuicide attempters by comparing groups of students with and without a history of a suicide attempt. Tasks: to identify the distinctive features of students who committed parasuicides comparing them to the control sample; to compare parasuicide attempters by gender; to search for strong points for the application of preventive activities in this age group. Materials and methods. The study involved 983 subjects: 245 young men (30 with a suicide attempt and 215 without it), 738 girls (56 with a suicide attempt and 682 without it). The study group included 86 students of both sexes, and the control group consisted of 897 subjects. The criterion for inclusion in the study group was a history of suicide attempt. Mathematical data processing was carried out using the SPSS program. Results and its discussion. Girls who had a suicide attempt in the past were statistically significantly characterized by a history of serious physical abuse, intentional self-injurious behavior and the presence of TBI. Indicators for these traits exceed those in the control group by 4.5; 2.6; 4.3 times. Three times more often, the respondents of the study group self-assess themselves as alcohol abusers, almost 45% of them smoke (17.7% in the control group), 21.4% used narcotic drugs and/or other psychoactive substances. In the group, the indicators on the basis of "the presence of suicide in a relative" are twice as high. 79% of the respondents of the study group tend to experience periods of low mood, 64% experience moments of hopelessness; 62.5% experience moments of acute loneliness, which significantly distinguishes them from the representatives of the control group. Young men who had a suicide attempt in the past were statistically significantly characterized by a number of non-suicidal autoaggressive phenomena. In addition to the facts of serious physical abuse in history, non- suicidal self-damaging behavior, which, by the way, are more common than similar indicators among the studied group of girls, there are also life-threatening hobbies (43.3%), a tendency to unjustified risk (40%). The "narcological spectrum" of the realization of auto-aggressive impulses in young men of the study group is represented by non-systematic use of psychoactive substances (40%), smoking (46.7%), subjective self-assessment as an alcohol abuser (36.7%). Frequent periods of low mood and moments of hopelessness (in both cases, 63.3%) should also be noted. 50% of the respondents in the study group reported that they experience an obsessive sense of shame, in the control group this figure is 3.5 times lower. In 36.7%, the persons of the study group admitted that they do not have a clear meaning of life. Differences in a series of comparisons of girls and boys who had a suicidal at tempt in the past are insignificant, which speaks in favor of their relationship, but we can talk about a certain sex-role coloring of the detected spectrum: a significantly higher frequency of non-systematic use of psychoactive substances, intentional self-harm and life-threatening hobbies in the youth group. Conclusions. Groups of parasuicidal girls and boys are, on the whole, very specific sections of the studied age and educational part of the population, concentrating a significant number of all patterns of autoaggression, which once again emphasizes the "kinship" of all patterns aimed at self-destruction. The results obtained in the study can be used in diagnostic algorithms for assessing suicidal risk.