Impact of some types of mass gatherings on current suicide risk in an urban population: statistical and negative binominal regression analysis of time series

A new paper by Eduard Ponarin

«Impact of some types of mass gatherings on current suicide risk in an urban population: statistical and negative binominal regression analysis of time series», a new paper by Eduard Ponarin (co-authored with Vasiliy Usenko, Sergey Svirin, and Yan Shchekaturov) has been published in is an open access, peer-reviewed international journal, BMC Public Health.

Many studies have investigated the impact of a wide range of social events on suicide-related behaviour. However, these studies have predominantly examined national events. The aim of this study is to provide a statistical evaluation of the relationship between mass gatherings in some relatively small urban sub-populations and the general suicide rates of a major city.

The data were gathered in the Ukrainian city of  Dnipropetrovsk, with a population of 1 million people, in 2005–2010. Suicide attempts, suicides, and the total amount of suicide-related behaviours were registered daily for each sex. Bivariate and multivariate statistical analysis, including negative binomial regression, were applied to assess the risk of suicide-related behaviour in the city’s general population for 7 days before and after 427 mass gatherings, such as concerts, football games, and non-regular mass events organized by the Orthodox Church and new religious movements.

The bivariate and multivariate statistical analyses found significant changes in some suicide-related behaviour rates in the city’s population after certain kinds of mass gatherings. In particular, we observed an increased relative risk (RR) of male suicide-related behaviour after a home defeat of the local football team (RR = 1.32, p = 0.047; regression coefficient beta = 0.371, p = 0.002), and an increased risk of male suicides (RR = 1.29, p = 0.006; beta =0.255, p = 0.002), male suicide-related behaviour (RR = 1.25, p = 0.019; beta =0.251, p < 0.001), and total suicide-related behaviour (RR = 1.23 p < 0.001; beta =0.187, p < 0.001) after events organized by the new religious movements.

Although football games and mass events organized by new religious movements involved a relatively small part of an urban population (1.6 and 0.3%, respectively), we observed a significant increase of the some suicide-related behaviour rates in the whole population. It is likely that the observed effect on suicide-related behaviour is related to one’s personal presence at the event rather than to its broadcast. Our findings can be explained largely in terms of Gabennesch’s theory of the ‘broken-promises effect’ with regard to intra- and interpersonal conflict and, in terms of crowd behaviour effects. 

Keywords: Suicide; Suicide attempt; Mass gatherings; Football; Concerts; Religion; New religious movements; Broken-promises effect; Conflict; Crowd behaviour

 

We congratulate Eduard and wish him further academic success!

 

   

  

 

*** Usenko, V. S., Svirin, S. N., Shchekaturov, Y. N., & Ponarin, E. D. (2014). Impact of some types of mass gatherings on current suicide risk in an urban population: statistical and negative binominal regression analysis of time series // BMC public health. Vol. 14. N 1. P. 308. Read online