COUNTY LEVEL SUICIDE RATES AND SOCIAL INTEGRATION: URBANICITY AND ITS ROLE IN THE RELATIONSHIP

This study adds to the existing research concerning ecological relationships between suicide rates, social interaction, and urbanicity in the United States. Age-sex-race adjusted five-year averaged suicide rates for 1993–1997 and various measures of urbanicity are used. Some proposed relationships held true, while others indicate that social integration and urbanicity are so intertwined in their effects on suicide that no clear, unidirectional pattern emerges. The religious affiliation measure captured unique variations in the role religion plays in this relationship, depending on how urbanicity was measured. Findings suggest closer attention needs to be paid to how both urbanicity and religious affiliation are measured. Overall, vast regional variation exists in suicide rates and the role of urbanization can be misunderstood if not properly specified.