The effect of survivalism–self-expressionism culture on black male suicide acceptability: A cross-national analysis

Cultural explanations of black suicide have focused on the US and stressed religiosity as a protective factor. This paper adds to this literature by (1) expanding the analysis of the impact of religiosity on black suicide to 10 nations, and (2) assessing the extent to which a broader cultural construct (self expressionism) affects black suicide acceptability. Data are from Wave 4 of the World Values Surveys 1991–2001 and refer to 3580 black males nested in ten countries. A hierarchical linear regression model determined that religiosity predicted black suicide acceptability across ten nations. Self expressionism was positively associated with individual level suicide acceptability. Further, a cross-level interaction was found wherein individual level and societal level self expressionism combined to affect suicide acceptability. The variability in suicide acceptability among black males is predicted, in part, by both individual and group levels of adherence to values contained in a major cultural axis of nations: self expressionism. These new found associations compliment the impact of a standard predictor, religiosity, on suicide acceptability.

► A factor found in American studies, religiosity, predicted black suicide acceptability across 10 nations.
► The analysis is the first to apply developments in comparative cultural sociology to the problem of suicide acceptability.
► Self expressionism, a major cultural axis of nations, was predictive of black suicide acceptability.
► The results support both the religiosity and the new cultural axis of nation’s explanations of black suicide acceptability.