*The following is excerpted from an online article posted on PsyPost.
Adolescents who engage in sexual intercourse tend to face higher odds of suicide attempts, according to new research. The study, published in the journal Psychiatry Research, examined more than 100,000 participants who were between 12 and 15 years old.
“Suicide is a global issue inflicting the majority of global regions and has a high prevalence among adolescents,” said study author Lee Smith, a reader in physical activity and public health at Anglia Ruskin University.
“Sexual intercourse in early adolescence may increase risk for suicidal behavior via mental disorders, distress resulting from being too psychologically immature to handle sexual relationships, and sexual violence particularly among girls.”
The researchers examined data from 116,820 adolescents in 38 countries who had participated in the Global School-based Student Health Survey.
After controlling for gender, age, food insecurity, anxiety-induced insomnia, and alcohol consumption, the researchers found an association between sexual intercourse and suicide attempts in 32 of the 38 countries.
“Those adolescents who had sexual intercourse had more than double the odds of having attempted suicide in the past 12 months compared with those who had never had intercourse,” Smith told PsyPost.