AN ASSESSMENT OF RELIGION'S ROLE IN MITIGATING SUICIDE AMONG TERTIARY INSTITUTIONS’ STUDENTS IN DELTA STATE OF NIGERIA

Suicide is a problem that affects all nations, but low- and middle-income nations are more susceptible because of the stigma associated with it and the lack of facilities that support mental health. With about one million deaths each year, suicide is a significant cause of mortality around the globe. This article evaluates the idea of suicide from a religious viewpoint among students attending tertiary institutions across Delta State, Nigeria. The phenomenological and descriptive methodologies are employed for data collection to achieve the study's objectives. The research population comprises students from nine higher educational institutions in Delta State. The result shows that suicide is motivated by numerous variables, such as sadness, excessive pressure, pessimism, financial hardships, and academic failure; that the incidence of suicide has drastically reduced among students of higher institutions because of religion’s big impact in offering understanding, information, wisdom, and faith on human lives. It concludes that further studies should be conducted on the role of religion in preventing suicide, its contextualization in Western knowledge, aiding NGOs in discovering suicide ideations, and providing a model for future researchers.