Attending religious services at least once a week may offer spiritual and social protection against suicide, a US study suggests.
The study followed nearly 90,000 women for over a decade in the Nurses’ Health Study. The risk of suicide was five times lower for women with regular religious attendance compared to women who did not attend services.
"There was also some evidence that this varied by religious affiliation: Protestant women who attended services once or more per week were approximately three times less likely to subsequently commit suicide, whereas Catholic women who attended services once or more per week were about 20 times less likely to commit suicide," lead author Tyler J. VanderWeele told Reuters.
An important mechanism relating religious service attendance and lower suicide risk might be the belief that suicide is morally wrong.- Tyler J. VanderWeele
Among women with a religious affiliation, most were Protestant or Catholic, and about 2,000 identified as Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu or "other."
Of all the women followed, 17,000 said they attended religious services more than once a week, 36,000 went once weekly, 14,000 went less than once per week and 22,000 never attended.
Focusing on the period between 1996 and 2010, the study team followed 89,708 participants. By 2010, 36 women had committed suicide according to the results in JAMA Psychiatry. Compared to women who did not attend services, those who went once a week or more had just 16 per cent of the risk.
"Those who attended religious services tended to subsequently have more social support, were less depressed, and consumed less alcohol," VanderWeele said.
"Our speculation is that an important mechanism relating religious service attendance and lower suicide risk might be the belief that suicide is morally wrong, but this would require other studies that assessed such moral beliefs," he said.
Suicide is one of the 10 leading causes of death in the US Psychiatrists, clinicians and healthcare providers should at least be aware that there may be a relationship between religious services and suicide risk, VanderWeele said.