Suicides among 13- and 14-year-olds in the United States have more than doubled the numbers between 2008 and 2018, according to a study conducted by scientists at Florida Atlantic University (FAU).
The study, which was conducted at the FAU Schmidt College of Medicine, showed that this increasing suicide trend was similar by gender or race in this age group in urban and rural areas, the latter being the most common areas.
In rural areas, firearms were used in 46.7% of suicides, while in metropolitan areas it was 34.7%.
According to the study, suicides were commonly committed in months like September and May, in addition to occurring in greater numbers on Mondays, and suggested that these suicides could be due to school stress.
“While further analytical studies are needed, there are important clinical and public health implications based on the findings of our study,” said study lead author and FAU Professor of Pediatrics Sarah K. Wood.
Wood stressed that the data from the studies point to a temporal correlation between the use of social networks, school stress and firearms, although they will have to do more research to determine it.
Charles H. Hennekens, a professor at FAU, and co-author of the study, noted that “during the years immediately preceding the onset of increases in suicide rates among 13- to 14-year-olds, several social media platforms were launched for teenagers”.
The professor pointed out that Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Myspace and Tumblr are the most used by adolescents.
“Collectively, all of these sites have grown to billions of users; but, as big as they are, in 2018, Instagram and Snapchat surpassed all but YouTube in terms of usage by teens,” Hennekens added, noting that the data showed that non-metropolitan areas have the highest suicide rates in teenagers.
Suicide has become the second leading cause of premature death among people ages 10 to 24 in the United States, while among teens ages 13 and 14 it is the leading cause of death.
With information from the EFE agency