Suicide Attempt Among Malaysian School-Going Adolescents: Relationship with Bullying

Abstract

Abstract BACKGROUND According to World Health Organization (WHO), the fourth leading cause of death among adolescents aged 15–19 years is suicide. The National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS) 2017 reported that suicidal ideation among Malaysian adolescents raised from 7.9–10%; suicidal plans increased from 6.4–7.3%, and suicidal attempts increased from 6.8% − 6.9% as compared to NHMS 2012. Of the three, suicide attempts are the most serious as they can cause significant negative impacts on health, social and economic status. Bullying is one of the factors for adolescent suicide attempts, and its relationship to suicidality in adolescents has been shown in numerous research. OBJECTIVES This study examined the relationship between suicide attempts and bullying among school adolescents in Malaysia. METHODS Data from the Malaysia NHMS 2017, a nationwide study which adopted a two-stage cluster sampling design, were analysed. The survey used a self-administered questionnaire in bilingual language adapted from GSHS developed by WHO. Participants were secondary school students aged 13–17 in all states. Descriptive and logistic regression analyses were performed using IBM SPSS version 28. RESULTS A total of 27,497 school adolescents participated in the study. Results showed that 6.9% of school adolescents had attempted suicide. There was 16.2% of adolescents being bullied. Multiple logistic regression revealed that students who were bullied were more likely to have suicide attempts (aOR 4.827, 95% CI: 4.143, 5.624) P < 0.001.