A new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research looked into the correlation between suicide rates and whether students were in school or out of school during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results showed that in-person schooling is correlated with teen suicide.
Ben Hansen, a research associate at the University of Oregon and the author of the study, told KMOX that there are well-documented patterns of teen suicide rates plummeting by around 23% during teh summer months — and it's only consistent with 12-18-year-olds.
"And then we found when schools finally shut down during COVID, there was actually a 30% drop in teen suicide, and no change for suicide for adults that are aged 19 to 25," Hansen said. "And then as schools reopened in the fall of 2020, we thought that suicide rates, again elevated for, for teens, but remained effectively the same for young adults."
There are a couple contributing factors to the drop in suicide rates, Hansen explained. One of them is that there was an increased amount of parental exposure and monitoring for kids. Plus, many kids didn't have to deal with bullying at school.
"Some other researchers also found that during the COVID era, that searches related to bullying — so things like, 'My child is being bullied' or just 'bullying' or 'cyberbullying' — those things generally follow the same sort of seasonal pattern that youth suicide does," he said. "And then when school shut down and COVID, there was a plummet in those searches related to bullying victimization."
Hear more about the study in youth suicide rates and how they relate to school from Ben Hansen:
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