Suicide amongst the Inuit of Nunavut: An Exploration of Life Trajectories

• Published in: International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
• Main Authors: William Affleck, Eduardo Chachamovich, Nadia Chawky, Guy Beauchamp, Gustavo Turecki, Monique Séguin
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2020
• Subjects: suicide; inuit; life trajectory; Medicine; R; Nunavut
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17061812; https://doaj.org/article/6e3afb3a5bf94e7c999e6059795e1e38

This article reports results of the life trajectories from 92 Inuit who died by suicide, matched for age and gender with 92 living-controls. A proxy-based procedure and semi-structured interviews with informants were conducted to obtain trajectories of developmental events occurring over the life course for suicide and community-matched controls. Results from this research indicate two different trajectories that differentiate the control-group from the suicide-group throughout the life course. Even though the number of suicide attempts are similar between both groups, the suicide-group had a more important burden of adversity, which seemed to create a cascading effect, leading to suicide.