Confucianism and Gender Ratios of Suicide in the World: A WHO Data-Based Study

Wei Wang; Jie Zhang; Wayne L Thompson

doi:10.3390/ijerph20032188

Confucianism and Gender Ratios of Suicide in the World: A WHO Data-Based Study

Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2023 Jan 25;20(3):2188. doi: 10.3390/ijerph20032188.

Authors

Wei Wang¹, Jie Zhang^{2

3}, Wayne L Thompson⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice, University of Delaware, Newark, DE 19716, USA.
² School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China.
³ Department of Sociology, State University of New York at Buffalo State, Buffalo, NY 14222, USA.
⁴ Department of Sociology, Carthage College, Kenosha, WI 53140, USA.

Abstract

This study explores how Confucianism affects suicide rates by gender. Data for the study come from the World Health Organization document "Suicide Worldwide in 2019", which provides frequency and gender ratios for suicide rates in 183 member countries. One-way ANOVA and multiple linear regression analysis were used to examine potential differences in suicide rates and male to female ratio of suicides. Independent variables include region, income level, culture, and Confucian values that may be related to suicide. Suicide rates for Confucian countries do not show significant differences from European countries. However, these countries have lower suicide gender ratios.

Keywords: China; Confucianism; culture; gender ratio; suicide.

MeSH terms

Confucianism
Europe
Female
Humans
Male
Suicide*
World Health Organization

Grants and funding

The authors of this study did not receive funding for the research and writing of the paper.