Use of firearms in homicides and suicides varied by gender and race

Firearms were less common in juvenile suicides than in murders committed by juveniles between 1981 and 1998. The NCHS data show that 62% of juveniles who committed suicide used a firearm, while the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI’s) Supplementary Homicide Reports indicate that firearms were used by 71% of juveniles who committed homicide. This pattern varied by gender and race.

Among juvenile males, the proportion who used firearms to commit murder (73%) was greater than the proportion who used them to commit suicide (65%). The reverse was true for juvenile females. Over the 1981–98 period, a firearm was used by 51% of juvenile females who committed suicide, but by just 38% of juvenile females who committed murder.

Most of the growth in juvenile suicides between 1981 and 1994 was firearm related, especially for males and black youth Although percentages of both firearm- and nonfirearm-related suicides increased between 1981 and 1994, the growth in juvenile suicides was tied to a greater increase in suicides involving firearms (57%) than in suicides involving other methods (23%). Over the same period, this general pattern of increases was found in the suicides of male juveniles (66% firearm related versus 23% nonfirearm related), white juveniles (41% versus 16%), and, especially, black juveniles (300% versus 106%). Firearm-related and nonfirearm-related suicides of females increased equally (24% each). The overall effect of the 28% decline in firearm-related suicides between 1994 and 1998 was muted by a 27% increase in nonfirearm-related juvenile suicides over the same period. Data source: NVSS, compiled by CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics. Population data from the U.S. Bureau of the Census. [See Data source notes for detail.]

White juveniles were equally likely to use a firearm to commit suicide (63%) as to commit murder (62%), as were American Indian juveniles, although they did so at much lower levels (45% in suicides and 47% in murders). In contrast, firearm use was less prevalent in suicides than in murders among both black juveniles (64% versus 77%) and Asian juveniles (46% versus 71%).

Juvenile Suicides, 1981–1998	Youth Violence Research Bulletin • March 2004