Emotions after socialization may explain link between suicidality, social disconnect

Key takeaways:

• People reporting suicidal ideation or behaviors did not experience an increase in positive affect after having a conversation with a new person.
• This may explain the link between suicidality and social disconnect.

WASHINGTON — Suicidality was associated with weakened positive affect reactivity during conversation, which may explain the link between suicidality and social disconnection, according to findings presented here.

“When we think about our sense of self and our sense of worth — where does that come from? A large part of it comes from other people, working together with others on a common goal or mission, being able to support other people ... and for us to have others we can reach out to and rely on in our time of need,” Charles Taylor, PhD, an associate adjunct professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego, in La Jolla, said during the presentation at the Anxiety and Depression Association of America Annual Conference “So you can imagine what happens if we don’t have social connections or we perceive that we don’t have other around that we can connect with or rely on.”

Taylor and colleagues enrolled 228 participants with anxiety or depression to talk with a person trained to lead a conversation designed to build a connection between them and the participant. Conversations consisted of a series of standardized questions that gradually increased in intimacy.

Participants rated positive and negative affects at baseline, after being told about the task and after the task. They also reported whether they wanted to socialize with their partner again in the future after completing the task.

In total, 82 participants reported suicidality in the past month and 146 reported no suicidality in the past month. Participants without suicidality reported an increase in positive affect from before to after the conversation task (P < .001), but there was no significant change in the group with suicidality.

Specifically, participants with suicidality had less post-task positive affect compared with their counterparts (P = .003). There were no between-group differences in baseline or pre-task positive affect. Mediation analyses indicated that post-task positive affect accounted for the association between suicidality and not wanting to socialize with their partner again.

There were no differences in negative affect between groups.

Building off these findings, the researchers are investigating whether the effects are the same in different populations — such as older adults and people with high risk for suicide — and in different contexts — such as a “social support context where people share a personal concern,” Taylor said during the presentation.