Risk for each factor varies, but risk for severe suicide\/self-harm alert is 70 times higher for youth with five or more online risk factors<\/p>\n<\/h3>\n
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FRIDAY, Sept. 24, 2021 (HealthDay News) — Discrete types of risk factors are identifiable from online data that are associated with subsequent youth suicide-related behavior, according to a study published online Sept. 20 in JAMA Network Open<\/em>.<\/p>\n Steven A. Sumner, M.D., from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, and colleagues evaluated the association between online risk factors and youth suicide-related behavior using real-world online activity data. The analysis included 227 youths having a severe suicide or self-harm alert requiring notification of school administrators matched (1:5) to 1,135 controls based on location, length of follow-up, and general volume of online activity.<\/p>\n The researchers found that all eight online risk factors (cyberbullying, violence, drug-related, hate speech, profanity, sexual content, depression, and low-severity self-harm) differed between case and control populations and were significantly associated with subsequent severe suicide\/self-harm alerts. There was a range in these associations from an adjusted odds ratio of 1.17 for drug-related content to an adjusted odds ratio of 1.82 for depression-related content. There was an exponentially larger risk for severe suicide\/self-harm alerts based on number of online risk factors, with youth with five or more of the eight risk factors having more than 70-fold increased odds of subsequently having a severe suicide\/self-harm alert (adjusted odds ratio, 78.64).<\/p>\n “Our findings suggest novel avenues for more timely and efficient assistance and youth suicide prevention efforts,” the authors write.<\/p>\n Several authors are employed by Bark, the online safety tool used in the study.<\/p>\n