Early-life influences on suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and suicide mortality: a life-course perspective to inform prevention

Project Information

LIFESPAN

Grant agreement ID: 793396

DOI

10.3030/793396

Project closed

EC signature date 12 April 2018

Start date 1 September 2018

End date 31 August 2021

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Total cost

€ 232 160,40

EU contribution

€ 232 160,40

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITE DE BORDEAUX
France

Periodic Reporting for period 2 - LIFESPAN (Early-life influences on suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and suicide mortality: a life-courseperspective to inform prevention)

Reporting period: 2020-09-01 to 2021-08-31

Summary of the context and overall objectives of the project

What is the problem/issue being addressed? The objective of this project is to understand how vulnerability to suicide emerge during the lifespan. Suicide is a complex and multifactorial phenomenon. While recognising the importance of immediate precipitating factors (unemployment, relationship problems), studies worldwide are showing that early-life events, occurring before or around birth, can influence later susceptibility to suicide. Therefore, the LIFESPAN project adopts a life-course perspective to examine the early-life influences on suicide, suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in the general population.

Why is this important for society? Suicide is a major public health concern and leading cause of death worldwide. Suicidal ideation and attempts, especially among youths, are of particular concern because of their associations with suicide, poor health, educational and employment outcomes. The World Health Organisation European Mental Health Action Plan has ranked suicide prevention among the highest priorities on the global public health agenda. By improving our understanding of the early-life influences on suicide, this project will contribute to clarifying the developmental origins of suicide by identifying preventable early-life factors associated with long-term risk of suicide and clarify pathways to suicide for individuals exposed to such factors. This knowledge may ultimately open new avenues for suicide prevention starting early in life, contributing to the H2020 aim of “promoting healthy ageing and personalised health care [which] will enable to better understand the determinants of health, keep the population healthier, preserve quality of life”.

What are the overall objectives? The LIFESPAN project comprises 3 complementary objectives: (1) to summarise available studies about the longitudinal relations between early-life influences and suicide mortality by applying meta-analysis; (2) to investigate the associations between early-life influences and suicidal ideation and attempts in adolescence and young adulthood with data from large longitudinal population-based cohorts; (3) to identify specific mediating pathways (targetable with new preventive interventions) linking early-life factors and suicide risk

Work performed from the beginning of the project to the end of the period covered by the report and main results achieved so far

During the three years of the project, we (1) published a systematic review and meta-analysis of the in-utero and perinatal influences on suicide risk, achieving the first objective of the project; (2) we published six papers (and an additional one is currently under review) exploring the role of perinatal adversities on the risk of suicide and suicide attempt using four different population-based cohorts; these papers also explored the role of potential mediating variables, including childhood cognitive and behavioural development, childhood emotional problems, and childhood interpersonal problems; as such, we achieved the objective 2 and 3 of the project; (3) published the findings of the project in a book chapter currently in press; (4) disseminated the results of these studies among researchers and clinicians during 11 presentation in international conferences and organized 3 symposia; presented results at a local levels during 8 invited presentations; disseminated the results via communication to the media, an article for the general public on The Conversation, and a website (www.lifespanproject.net).

Progress beyond the state of the art and expected potential impact (including the socio-economic impact and the wider societal implications of the project so far)

The project produced the first systematic review of the in-utero and perinatal influences on suicide risk and generated hypotheses new hypothesis that were subsequently tested, which allowed us to (1) describe profiles of exposure to early-life adversity and their association with suicidal ideation and attempt, (2) document the explanatory mechanisms linking early-life factors and suicide risk, (3) provide evidence for causality in the association between foetal growth and suicide risk using quasi-experimental studies, (4) quantify the ability of early-life factors to predict future suicide attempts, (5) explore the role of the timing of exposure to maternal smoking in-utero and during early childhood on offspring suicide risk. This project represents the largest and more systematic documentation of the role of perinatal factors in the aetiology of suicide.

Latent symposium organised at the International Summit on Suicide Research