Healthy Life Behaviors and Suicide Probability in University Students Esra Engin, Dondu Cuhadar, and Emel Ozturk This study aims to determine the sociodemographic factors and healthy life behaviors affecting suicide and suicide probability of university students. The research was designed as a complementary study and conducted with 334 students from several faculties and colleges at Ege University, Turkey. The study findings indicated that suicide probability could be affected by the students’ age, their problems at school, their troubled relations with friends, and a psychiatric disorder history within the last year. Moreover, it was con- cluded that the students with healthy life behaviors had significantly lower scores on the Suicide Probability Scale and its subscales. © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. A DOLESCENCE IS A period that is located between childhood and adulthood and a period of development, spiritual maturity, and preparation for life. The rapid growth that begins with puberty finishes with psychical, sexual, and emotional maturity at the end of youth (Yörükoğlu 2007). Adolescence is a period with specific behavioral characteristics, problems, and needs through which young people experience significant psychical and psychological changes. Adolescents are regarded neither as children nor adults. Young people should prioritize the efforts to maintain their health to assure a healthy society. Therefore, the fundamental initiative should be to equip young people with the prerequisite knowledge to preserve and maintain health (Ünalan, Şenol, Öztürk, & Erkorkmaz, 2007). Health improvement activities usually refer to the behaviors that increase an individual's level of wellness and achieve self-fulfillment. A healthy lifestyle is supposed to protect people from illnesses and also promote increasing levels of wellness. Healthy lifestyle behaviors include balanced nutri- tion, stress management, regular and sufficient exercise program, prevention and cessation of alcohol and substance abuse, awareness of one's own health responsibilities, and taking necessary precautions in hygiene (Kocaoğlu, 2006). That an individual pays particular attention to pursue health improvement activities exhibits that he or she has self-esteem and takes health matters seriously. As noted in Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory, if physiological needs, which are the first step in the hierarchy and have vital importance, are not met, people cannot reach the last step, which includes self-realization and self-satisfaction (Ersanlı, 2005). According to results of studies, suicidal tendency and suicide ideation are related to risky behaviors such as inactivity, obesity, not applying healthy life behaviors (Norlev, Davidsen, Sundram, & Kjoller, 2005), not participating in sports activities (Brown et al., 2007), and irregular sleep patterns (Goodwin and Marusiz, 2008). Everybody has an ideal self-esteem. People strive to develop this missed, appropriated, and ideal self- esteem and become satisfied and closer to the ideal ego. Sometimes, this ideal ego remains as a longing Available online at www.sciencedirect.com From the Department of Psychiatric Nursing, Ege University School of Nursing, Bornova, Izmir, Turkey. Corresponding Author: Esra Engin, Assistant Prof., PhD, RN, Department of Psychiatric Nursing, Ege University School of Nursing, Bornova, 35100, Izmir, Turkey. E–mail addresses: esraengin@yahoo.co.uk (E. Engin), donducuhadar@hotmail.com (D. Cuhadar), wishi_87@hotmail.com (E. Ozturk). © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 0883-9417/1801-0005$34.00/0 doi:10.1016/j.apnu.2011.05.001 Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, Vol. 26, No. 1 (February), 2012: pp 43–53 43