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. 2021 May;9(3):482-488.
doi: 10.1177/2167702621993857.

Increase in Suicidal Thinking During COVID-19

Rebecca G Fortgang  1   2 , Shirley B Wang  1 , Alexander J Millner  1   3 , Azure Reid-Russell  1 , Anna L Beukenhorst  4 , Evan M Kleiman  5 , Kate H Bentley  1   2 , Kelly L Zuromski  1   3 , Maha Al-Suwaidi  1 , Suzanne A Bird  2 , Ralph Buonopane  3 , Dylan DeMarco  1 , Adam Haim  6 , Victoria W Joyce  3 , Erik K Kastman  1 , Erin Kilbury  1   2 , Hye-In S Lee  1 , Patrick Mair  1 , Carol C Nash  3 , Jukka-Pekka Onnela  4 , Jordan W Smoller  2 , Matthew K Nock  1   2   3
Affiliations

Increase in Suicidal Thinking During COVID-19

Rebecca G Fortgang et al. Clin Psychol Sci. 2021 May.

Abstract

There is concern that the COVID-19 pandemic may cause increased risk of suicide. In the current study, we tested whether suicidal thinking has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic and whether such thinking was predicted by increased feelings of social isolation. In a sample of 55 individuals recently hospitalized for suicidal thinking or behaviors and participating in a 6-month intensive longitudinal smartphone monitoring study, we examined suicidal thinking and isolation before and after the COVID-19 pandemic was declared a national emergency in the United States. We found that suicidal thinking increased significantly among adults (odds ratio [OR] = 4.01, 95% confidence interval [CI] = [3.28, 4.90], p < .001) but not adolescents (OR = 0.84, 95% CI = [0.69, 1.01], p = .07) during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Increased feelings of isolation predicted suicidal thinking during the pandemic phase. Given the importance of social distancing policies, these findings support the need for digital outreach and treatment.

Keywords: interpersonal interaction; longitudinal methods; suicide prevention.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Conflicting Interests: J. W. Smoller is an unpaid member of the Bipolar/Depression Research Community Advisory Panel of 23andMe, a member of the Leon Levy Foundation Neuroscience Advisory Board, and received an honorarium for an internal seminar at Biogen, Inc. M. K. Nock is an unpaid member of the TalkLife Advisory Board. The author(s) declared that there were no other potential conflicts of interest with respect to the authorship or the publication of this article.

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Average self-reported (a) suicidal ideation and (b) isolation scores over time in adolescents (top panels) and adults (bottom panels). The vertical lines represent March 13, 2020, separating the prepandemic phase from the pandemic phase.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
Suicidal thinking trajectories. This plot shows the changes in suicidal thinking scores over time as a smoothed function on average across participants (bold black line) as well as for each individual participant (light dashed and solid lines). The dashed bold black lines indicate the 95% confidence interval. The vertical line represents March 13, 2020, separating the prepandemic phase from the pandemic phase.
Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.
Hours spent at home per day. The blue line represents average across participants each day, and the gray lines represent individual participants. Vertical dashed line is March 13, 2020, the start of the pandemic phase, and plot shows 35 days before and after this date.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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