| ObjectiveTo explore the prevalence of life course sexual abuse experiences and suicide-related behaviors in the college students,and to investigate the association between different characteristics of sexual abuse experiences and suicide-related behaviors and its gender differences,and explore the moderating role of self-esteem in sexual abuse experiences and suicide ideation.MethodsIn October 2018,a multi-stage stratification method was used to select participants.According to the type of college school,engineering,science,agronomy,and medical schools were selected in Hefei,and then 2 to 5 classes of college students aged ≥18years old in each major and each grade were selected to conduct a questionnaire survey.The questionnaire mainly includes its demographic characteristics,sexual abuse scale,suicide-related behavior scale,depression scale.A total of 4,287 questionnaires were sent out,173 students refused to participate in the survey.4,114 questionnaires were collected,and 4,034 valid questionnaires were finally obtained after the invalid questionnaires were eliminated,with an effective rate of 98%.Epidata3.1 parallel double entry was used to establish a database,SPSS23.0 software was used for statistical description and correlation analysis,and Mplus7.0 software was used for latent classes analysis of sexual abuse.ResultsAmong the 4,034 college students,the detection rates of sexual abuse in elementary school or earlier,junior high school,high school and college were 9.6%,4.6%,4.5%,and 6.1%,respectively.Compared with females,males have a higher detection rate of junior high school sexual abuse experience.The detection rates of suicide ideation,suicide plan,suicide preparation,and suicide attempt were 9.9%,3.0%,2.1%,and1.3%,respectively.Compared with females,males had higher rates of suicide plan,suicide preparation,and suicide attempt.For males,sexual abuse in elementary school or earlier was associated with suicide ideation(OR: 3.29,95%CI: 2.20-5.38),suicide plan(OR: 3.44,95%CI: 1.54-7.77),suicide preparation(OR: 3.05,95%CI: 1.19-7.74);sexual abuse in college was associated with suicide ideation(OR: 3.81,95%CI: 2.07-7.00),suicide plan(OR: 4.67,95%CI: 1.89-11.52).For females,sexual abuse experience in college was only associated with suicide ideation(OR: 2.47,95%CI: 1.24-4.93).Three types of sexual abuse were all associated with females’ s suicide ideation,suicide plan,suicide preparation,and suicide attempt;for females,only noncontact sexual abuse(OR: 2.04,95%CI: 1.38-3.01),only contact sexual abuse(OR: 3.57,95%CI: 2.24-5.67)was only associated with suicide ideation,who experienced both noncontact and contact sexual abuse were associated suicide ideation(OR: 3.85,95%CI: 2.26-6.55),suicide plan(OR: 3.52,95%CI: 1.45-8.54),suicide preparation(OR:6.28,95%CI: 2.23-17.73),suicide attempt(OR: 6.32,95%CI: 1.21-32.99).Both males and females all identified three latent classes of sexual abuse experiences,namely low sexual abuse,moderate sexual abuse,and persistent sexual abuse.Moderate sexual abuse was associated with males’ s suicide ideation(OR: 2.40,95%CI: 1.60-3.61),suicide plan(OR: 2.64,95%CI: 1.34-5.19),suicide preparation(OR: 2.85,95%CI: 1.36-6.01),suicide attempt(OR: 3.53,95%CI: 1.38-9.01);persistent sexual abuse can increase the risk of suicide ideation(OR: 2.72,95%CI:1.49-4.97),suicide plan(OR: 5.07,95%CI: 2.27-11.31),suicide preparation(OR: 4.78,95%CI: 2.04-11.21),suicide attempt(OR: 8.38,95%CI: 3.19-22.01).Compared with moderate sexual abuse,persistent sexual abuse has a higher risk of suicide-related behaviors.For females,only moderate sexual abuse was associated with suicide ideation(OR: 2.30,95%CI: 1.59-3.34).ConclusionsThe detection rates of sexual abuse and suicide-related behaviors of college students are relatively high.The association between sexual abuse and suicide-related behaviors varies according to the characteristics of the sexual abuse and there are gender differences.The relationships between sexual abuse and suicide-related behaviors were stronger in males than in females. |
