Social Change and Micronesian Suicide Mortality: A Test of Competing Hypotheses

Abstract

How do modernizing social changes affect suicide risks for youths in small economically developing societies? Since Durkheim, social researchers have hypothesized that processes of social disintegration and processes of normative cultural disequilibrium can increase suicide rates. A lifestyle incongruity hypothesis has also been proposed. This article tests these competing hypotheses for the epidemic of suicide that occurred on culturally diverse communities of the Pacific Islands of Micronesia. The sample includes 74 municipalities of the Federated States of Micronesia. Multiple regression analyses suggest that the best analytic model includes the degree of urbanization, the levels of social integration, and the incongruity between modern economic resources and achieved modern material lifestyle. These results suggest that researchers should attend more to the way communities aspire to and participate in global markets as opposed to shifting adult role structures and occupations as a site for understanding the relationship between rapid social change and suicide.