Abstract
Men have been underrepresented in research investigating the pathway from social anxiety through loneliness to suicidality. The present study examined loneliness as a mediator between social anxiety and suicidality among men, along with exposure to childhood trauma as a moderator of this pathway. A nationally representative sample of 530 Canadian men completed study measures online. Bootstrapped tests of indirect effects indicated loneliness to be a significant mediator after controlling for depression symptoms, and this mediation effect was moderated by exposure to multiple types of childhood trauma. The link between social anxiety and loneliness––and the mediating effect of loneliness on suicidality––was strongest among men reporting two or more types of childhood trauma. Efforts to mitigate men’s suicidality in the context of social anxiety may benefit from targeting loneliness, with particular attention to the effects of childhood trauma.
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Anonymized data will be made available upon reasonable request to the first author.
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Funding
This study was funded by Movember Canada, grant #11R18455. Preparation of this manuscript was supported by a Scholar Award, #18317, awarded to the first author by the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research. SMR was supported by a Career Development Fellowship from the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (GNT1158881), and a Dame Kate Campbell Fellowship from the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at The University of Melbourne.
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Kealy, D., Rice, S.M., Seidler, Z.E. et al. Social anxiety and suicidality among men: examining the effects of loneliness and childhood trauma. Curr Psychol 42, 8709–8712 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-021-02235-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-021-02235-z