[Civil status and suicide]. / El estado civil y el suicidio en Baja California Sur.

OBJECTIVE: To determine if civil status acts as a risk factor in suicide and how it modifies according to gender, age and population size. METHODS: A retrospective study which analyzes information from the mortality data from the National Institute of Statistics, Geography and Information, from 1998 to 2002. Variables like suicides age, sex, cause of death, federal entity, population size and civil status were registered. RESULTS: Single men showed twofold risk for committing suicide. Women did not show any associated risk for suicide according to civil status. The risk of married men for committing suicide increased gradually with age. Medium-sized communities with less than 19,999 habitants presented the highest risk for habitants to commit suicide. CONCLUSIONS: Suicide is associated to gender especially to men who are not married and living in small and medium-sized communities. One explanation could be the lack of integrated behavior as defined by Emile Durkheim, where the physical density of society will determine behavior and ideas. This social structure phenomenon is called the "moral cocoon." This works around the individual being less individualistic and granting him/her the feeling of belonging to a group.