THEORETICAL BACKGROUND & HYPOTHESES
We integrate in this work the neighborhood, school and family contexts, and with
attention to individuals’ depression, examine the effect of these social circles on
adolescents’ suicidal behaviors. Consistent with the Durkheimian tradition, we argue that
prevalence of integrative and regulative processes within families (parent attachment and
supervision) schools (school attachment) and neighborhoods (neighborhoods’ level of
religiosity and social disorganization) reduce adolescents’ likelihood to engage in suicidal
behaviors. Relaying on Pescosolido & Georgianna’s (1989) reformulation of Durkheim’s
religion ideas, we contend that neighborhoods constitute the context in which residents’
religion exists, and suggest that highly religious neighborhoods are highly integrative and
regulative due to presence of active religious organizations (that support community
lives), solid religious social networks and frequent interactions between adherents.
Hence, we hypothesize that highly religious neighborhoods--here operationalized as
proportion conservative population and neighborhoods’ importance of religion--
significantly reduce adolescent suicide attempts. In line with vast psychological research
(Brezo, Paris & Turecki, 2006) we also assume that depression has a significant effect on
adolescents’ suicide attempts. Nevertheless, we argue that depression’s effect on suicide
attempts can be reduced in highly religious neighborhoods. Specifically, we examine the
interactive effects of individual depression and neighborhood level constructs and focus
on the cross-level interaction between depression and neighborhoods’ importance of
religion.
DATA AND METHODS
Convention