Assess the Level of Knowledge and Attitude Towards Suicide Among B.Sc. Nursing Students of Selected Nursing Colleges of South Western Rajasthan with a View to Develop Self Instructional Manual (SIM) on Suicide Prevention

Abstract

Background: Suicide has become a primary cause of mortality and illness in adolescents and new adults worldwide and has been documented as one of the significant mental health problems moving school students. Nursing students may be at advanced danger for suicide than other college students. Tension and unhappiness can consequence in low academic presentation, low excellence of life and unhappy opinions. Objectives: (1) To assess the level of Knowledge and attitude related to suicide among B.Sc. Nursing students; (2) To find out the suggestion between Knowledge and Attitude of suicide with nominated socio demographic variables; (3) To regulate the association between Knowledge and Attitude concerning suicide. Methodology: A non-experimental, descriptive exploratory survey approach was used for the study. Data was collected from 100 first year and second year B.Sc. nursing students by Non-probability consecutive sampling technique who were studying in selected nursing colleges of South Western, Rajasthan. Self-structured questionnaires were used to assess the level of knowledge of suicide and standardized Attitudes Towards Suicide Questionnaire scale (ATTS) adopted by Renberg and Jacobson (2003) was used to assess attitude toward suicide. Result: Findings related to level of knowledge showed that the highest percentage (51%) of students were having poor knowledge, only (2%) students having very good knowledge about suicide. Findings related to level of attitude towards suicide showed majority (67%) of students have Negative attitude. Findings related to association showed that there was significant association between currently stay and level of knowledge (χ2 –18.7, P<0.05), significant association between age and level of attitude (χ2 –7.1, P<0.05) and significant association between year of study and level of attitude (χ2 –8.56, P<0.05). Findings related to correlation between level of knowledge and level of attitude on suicide among B.Sc. nursing 1st year and 2nd year student showed that there is moderately positive correlation (r=0.60) between level of knowledge and level of attitude. Conclusion: Negative influence of technology, poor social and coping support, maladjustment to life, depression, negative thought can lead to suicidal thoughts. There was poor knowledge and negative attitude towards suicide among those students. Hence, we provided self-instructional module (SIM) which focused on suicide prevention among adolescents.