Psychosocial Aspects of Suicide in Young Chinese Rural Women

A sample of 90 rural Chinese women were interviewed and tested to assess a theoretical model that assumes suicide ideation is a function of four broad theoretical variables: 1) psychological aspects such as self-esteem and personal adjustment; 2) coping aspects; 3) environmental aspects, specifically the degree of support found in the family and in the community; and 4) attitudes toward suicide. The data were analyzed first for reliability, which was found to be adequate, and then from a covariance structure modeling approach—i.e., LISREL. The results are complex, but do suggest a relative fit between theoretical model and observed data, though the fit is limited by a number of necessary assumptions in covariance structural modeling that may not reflect psychological and psychometric reality.