Recently, the rate at which undergraduate students in Nigeria are intentionally terminating their own lives is on the increase and this creates a concern for society. Although, suicidal behavior cuts across all ages, cultures, countries, races, religions, and colours, as it is being reported as the second leading cause of death among youths aged between 15 and 29 years worldwide [1]. This preventable act remains a major health, psychological, social, and cultural concern globally and claims hundreds of thousands of lives. More worrisome is the fact that young adults are the major victims; they are either preparing themselves or already productive, with high expectations on them to contribute meaningfully to the social and economic developments of their various nations. Owing to the fact that the majority of these young people may still be depending on either parents, relatives or significant others for survival, one might be worried about what could have been the possible causes of suicide among these youngsters. In Nigeria, particularly, it was reported that in 2018, 66 cases were reported and out of 42 recorded cases between January and June 2019, 11 were undergraduate students [2]. Suicide cases among these students might not be unconnected to a high rate of economic hardship and insecurity in the country resulting from job losses by their sponsors, daily increase in unemployment, and insurgency activities [3].

More distressing is the fact that every 40 seconds, someone somewhere around the world takes his/her own life [4]; about 78% of these individuals are from low- and middle-income nations. Also, 79% of all reported suicide cases, which represent the larger part of the global suicide burden, were from developing countries [4]. This indicates that economic hardship or poverty might be one of the leading causes of the high rate of suicide deaths in developing nations of the world [4]. Because of this economic indicator, WHO adopted a mental health plan which aims to reduce the rate of suicide in member countries by 10% by 2020 [5]. Bearing this in mind, counselling psychologists and researchers have critical roles to play in identifying individual suicidal tendencies, especially among undergraduate students in Nigeria and Africa at large. Before the actual suicidal deaths or acts, there is the likelihood of continuous thoughts, intents, and attempts. Thus, suicidal tendencies are the primary and critical phase in the suicide process which could be triggered by any psychological, social, biological, economic, and spiritual stimulus resulting in complete suicide. Regrettably, this initial stage remains understudied by researchers; hence, the daily cases of suicide in every society are increasing.

Similarly, among several terminologies that are often used to describe suicide, the term “suicidal tendencies” is not popular, unlike actual suicide, thoughts/ideation, intent, attempt, and behavior. Scholars across the globe conceptualize each of these terminologies differently. For example, actual suicide is described as a deliberate self-inflicted death of conscious effort to end one’s life [6]. Perceived suicide is seen as the intentional use of injurious elements, poisoning or suffocation to end one’s life [7]. This definition is similar to the [8] definition that refers to suicide as any behavior that is self-initiated and carried out with the intention to die. Suicide ideation or thoughts are other terminologies which are often used interchangeably; they imply intents or thoughts and cognitions to kill self. Also, suicidal intent is the wish of an individual to want to end his or her life, while a suicide attempt refers to self-injurious actions or activities for the purpose of causing death [9, 10]. This entire process is called suicidal behavior. It is important to note that suicidal tendencies are always unconsciously undermined in the continuum which is very dangerous if any meaningful prevention would be achieved.

Several past studies in Nigeria have focused more on other stages in the suicide process; these include suicidal attempts, ideation, completed suicide and behavior [11-13]. Thus, to forestall suicide, to some large extent suicide tendencies are germane [14]. As mentioned earlier, nobody is immune to suicide especially when one is experiencing psychosocial or economic distress. Suicide tendency is a critical part of the suicide process; it precedes suicide thoughts/ideation, attempts, and completed suicides [15]. Essentially, identification of this first step in the suicide process – that is, suicide tendency – is crucial if the suicide progression is to be terminated and reduced [16]. Furthermore, there are several underlying factors that predispose people to commit suicide. These have been identified and studied and include depression, substance use, hopelessness, job loss, social isolation, mental disorder, and family history [17]. In addition to depression and hopelessness, perceived stress, and religiosity were considered and academic stress and socioeconomic status were identified as predisposing factors to suicidal ideation.

Very recently, interpersonal relationships, anxiety and stress, sexual abuse, unemployment and poverty, childhood adversity and terminal diseases were investigated as other predisposing factors associated with suicidal behavior. Epidemiological researchers classified specific factors that are closely associated with heightened risk for suicidal behaviors into social, psychological, economic, cultural, and biological/generic [18] behaviors. Conflict or disaster, violence, trauma or abuse, and chronic pain or illness were also associated factors [18]. In other words, personal and life events factors could contribute to someone’s decision to commit suicide. Historically, Hawton [19] outlined that people could commit or attempt suicide because of heroic reasons – voluntary death for the good of others. Commonly, people die to escape unbearable or distressing situations. Another reason for suicide could be romantic – this usually occurs among people who are in love and one partner dies suddenly. Manipulation suicide is more like a threatened suicide attempt to manipulate others and is common among children and youths. Given this understanding, it becomes imperative to advance research on the tendencies to commit suicide and its associating factors among university students and to suggest possible preventions and interventions for its reduction.

The study adopted the quantitative research method, and the descriptive design of correlation type was employed. The study was conducted between July and September 2019, with undergraduate students from six federal and state-owned universities in South West Nigeria. Nigeria has a population of more than 2 000 million, with over 60% being youths. The country has six regions: North Central, North East, North West, South East, South, and South West where the study was conducted. Generically, South West comprises six states (Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, and Ekiti). Adopting the multistage sampling methods, 350 students were sampled from each of the six states, totaling 2 100 students. The technique encompasses four stages of selection.

Table 2 revealed that undergraduate students are 7.5% likely to commit suicide using logistic regression analysis of multinomial.

Of 2 100 sampled participants, in 2003 completed the questionnaires, of which 151 (7.5%) acknowledged that they have suicidal tendencies. The probability of the study participants’ suicidal tendencies was 7.5% accurately correct.

This study advances scholarly understanding of some risk factors that are associated with suicidal tendencies among undergraduate students in southwest Nigeria. The finding demonstrates that the sampled participants had low tendencies to commit suicide. Suicidal thoughts and behaviors happen more often than complete suicide and as a precursor to suicide. It is important to understand the baseline behavior – otherwise called suicidal tendencies – to determine the possibility of suicide among youths of non-Western cultures, such as those in universities across the six states of southwest Nigeria. As mentioned, suicidal tendencies comprise the primary and critical phases in the suicide process which, when triggered by some past trauma experiences coupled with present pressure, often possibly increases the risk of poor reaction to stressors, thereby predisposing its victims to suicidal ideation and behaviors. As revealed in this study, a small proportion of undergraduate students have suicidal tendencies and perhaps suicide might be avoided if perceived common risk factors are not ignored. This finding substantiates past studies [37-39] where a high rate of suicidal ideation was found.

Furthermore, of the nine risk factors considered in this study, only alcoholism and helplessness reported a strong and significant association with suicide tendencies, while factors such as gender, age, depression, hopeless, self-worried, self-doubt, and inefficacy had a weak and non-significant association with suicidal tendencies in this study. The significant contribution of alcoholism to suicidal tendencies may be reflective of the fact that undergraduate students are in their youthful stage when exploration is a common characteristic. Hence, alcohol consumption is sometimes used as a coping strategy. However, too much alcohol could be an indication of suicidal tendencies. Additionally, helplessness was found to have a strong association with suicidal tendencies in this study, which might be explained by higher levels of cultural bonding and family support – known as a collectivist culture – that is gradually going into extinction in Africa. In the Yorùbá-speaking culture where the study was conducted, providing support for those in need is a charitable character inherent in individuals and families as useful members of the society [40]. Surprisingly, this study found no evidence of association of several well-established suicide risk factors, such as depression hopelessness, self-worry, self-doubt, and inefficacy. However, this finding is consistent with previous research [41, 42] that found that these factors appear to be associated with suicide attempts because they are associated with the process of suicidal behavior and could trigger suicidal thoughts. This explains the fact that suicidal tendencies are dormant risk factors that could be activated early by factors such as alcoholism and hopelessness.

This study demonstrates that suicidal tendencies prevail slightly among university students, with self-doubt and helplessness found to have strong association with suicidal tendencies among undergraduate students in South West Nigeria. Therefore, the outcome of this study could assist mental health, public health, counselling psychologists, psychiatrists, as well as other medical professionals in developing protective factors and strategies for suicide prevention, relevant to university students. This would enhance self-identity and purpose in life as they go through several challenges that may post a threat to their future goals and achievements. Based on these findings, it is suggested that counselling psychologists, public health providers and policymakers should give urgent attention to the issue of suicide among university students by creating regular awareness on issues of suicide across universities in Nigeria. Also, effective suicide prevention strategies – that could include but not be limited to social support – should be developed to achieve the global World Health Organisation strategic plan of preventing suicide. In other words, suicide risk mitigation interventions that build on school/social support would add to resilient living in these collectivist cultures young people. There is a need to introduce suicidal prevention education into the university curriculum as a way of containing the prevalence of suicide among adolescents and youths.

This intellectual piece is not without limitations. First, this study only considered university students, whereas there are some youths who might have graduated several years previously and are still without jobs; they may be frustrated and thinking of committing suicide. Secondly, given several studies that have predicted many risk factors associated with suicide, future research could consider quasi-experimental study which could help prevent suicidal behavior. This suggests that future researchers should focus more on preventive measures by giving attention to other psychosocial and personal risk indicators.