Victimization, Suicidality, and Cultural Factors Among Latino Youth

Background and Purpose: Suicide is the second leading cause of youth death in the U.S., while this issue is under-studied among Latino youth. Particularly, research that focuses on victimization and cultural factors is lacking. To fill this research gap, this study aims to use a longitudinal Latino youth dataset to investigate the relationships among victimization, cultural factors, and suicidality in Latino youth. The present study seeks to answer three research questions: 1. What are the relationships between various types of victimization and youth’s suicidality? 2. How are cultural factors (i.e., Anglo orientation, Latino orientation, family support, and immigration status) linked to suicidality? 3. Do the cultural factors moderate the relationship between victimization and suicidality?

Methods: Longitudinal data came from the Dating Violence Among Latino Adolescents (DAVILA) study, collected from a nationwide sample of Latino teenagers living in the U.S. At Wave 1, 1,525 Latino teenagers between the ages of 12 and 18 and their parents/guardians completed phone interviews between September 2011 and February 2012. Participants who agreed to be contacted again were interviewed again between February 2013 and August 2013. A total of 565 cases were included in this study. The sample reported a mean age of 14.76, and over half were female. About 27% of youth were immigrants. Independent variables included six types of victimization, including child maltreatment, dating violence, stalking, sexual violence, peer/sibling bullying, and conventional crime. The dependent variable was youth’s self-reported suicidality, assessed by the Brief Symptom Inventory. Moderators included Anglo and Latino orientation, measured by the Brief Acculturation Rating Scale for Mexican Americans-II, family support, assessed using the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, and immigration status. Linear regression was employed for data analysis.

Results: Although the specific types of victimization at Wave 1 were not associated with youth’s suicidality at Wave 2, family support was negatively associated with suicidality in three out of six models. Additionally, immigration status, family support, and Latino orientation moderated the associations between several types of victimization and suicidality. Specifically, compared to non-immigrant youth, immigrant youth reported increasing suicidality after high levels of child maltreatment and sexual violence. Youth who had a higher level of family support, as opposed to those who had a lower level of family support, reported a higher level of suicidality after more dating violence and conventional crime victimization. When youth had a higher level of Latino orientation, high levels of peer/sibling bullying and conventional crime victimization were associated with more suicidality, compared to youth having a lower level of Latino orientation.

Conclusions and Implications: The findings suggest that family support, Latino orientation, and immigrant status modified the relationships between certain types of victimization and suicidality, which highlights the importance of cultural factors on Latino youth’s suicidality after victimization. The findings imply the crucial roles of culturally responsive research and practice when considering Latino youth’s victimization and suicidality.