Identity-Based Discrimination and Suicide Risk for Sexual Minority College Students

Background/Purpose: Suicide is a major public health issue in the United States and the JED Foundation reports upwards of 25.5% of college students aged 18 to 24 years old have seriously considered suicide in the past month. The most recent American College Health Association (ACHA) National College Health Assessment found 27.6% of students screened positive for suicidal risk and 2.5% had a serious suicide attempt in the past year. Traditional-aged college students are among those at greatest risk, and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer or questioning (LGBTQ) students face some of the highest risk and mental health issues compared to their cis-hetero peers. Building upon Joiner’s interpersonal psychological theory of suicide, Crenshaw’s concept of intersectionality and Meyer’s minority stress theory provide a framework to explore experiences of discrimination, risk and protective factors, and how these may relate to suicide risk for sexual minority college students.

Methods: Using publicly available secondary data from the Healthy Minds Study (HMS, 2021-2022), a latent class analysis (LCA) was conducted on a subsample of sexual minority college students to explore if distinct latent classes emerged based on the following measures: suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STB), risk and protective factors, experiences of discrimination, race, ethnicity, and gender minority status. Risk factors included in the analysis were self-injurious behaviors, depression, loneliness. Protective factors included were psychological well-being, resilience, sense of belonging, sources of social support, and exercise.

Results: From the sample of N = 10,169 sexual minority college students, 86.48% (n = 8,794) were 18-24 years old. A total 25.57% (n = 2,600) had STB, which was roughly twice that found within the larger full sample (N = 95,860; 12.90%; n = 12,367). The sexual minority college students experienced multiple forms of identity-based discrimination; 15.45% (n = 1,571) had gender-based discrimination, 8.53% (n = 867) sexuality-based discrimination, 6.01% (n = 611) race-based discrimination, and 5.93% (n = 603) culture-based discrimination. Three distinct classes emerged from the LCA and were named: 1) the Average Resilience and Well-Being group (47%; n = 4,735), which was characterized by fewer risk factors and more protective factors and least identity-based discrimination; 2) the Discriminated Against group (6%; n = 626), which was the most racially and ethnically diverse and had the highest discrimination and financial stress; and 3) the Mental Health Needs group (47%; n = 4,808) which had the most STB, most depression, self-injurious behaviors, and loneliness, and least protective factors

Conclusion: Findings contribute to the growing empirical evidence that multiple marginalized identities and experiences of discrimination may relate to suicide risk. Results provide a foundation for future research that could aid in suicide prevention with LGBTQ people going forward. Findings suggest that identity-based discrimination may be an important factor involved in suicide risk for this group, and suicide risk assessments could be improved to detect risk more accurately. Future research should examine unique risk and protective factors for LGBTQ people and higher education institutions could target identity-based discrimination as part of their overall suicide prevention strategies.