Synodic lunar phases and suicide: based on 2605 suicides over 23 years, a full moon peak is apparent in premenopausal women from northern Finland

Suicide data for this study were available for the period of March 1988 to June 2011, and involved 2111 male and 494 female victims from the Finnish province of Oulu. Data for lunar phases during that period were categorised into three groups: new moon (<25% visible), full moon (>75% visible) and other times with values in between. Seasonal effects were controlled with definitions for winter (Nov, Dec, Jan), spring (Feb, Mar, Apr), summer (May, June, July), and autumn (Aug, Sep, Oct). Suicide occurrences during different lunar phases were compared with their expected distribution using multinomial tests with all tests being two-tailed. Statistical significance was set at p < 0.05. No correlation between suicides and moon phase in any of the four seasons was apparent for male victims, but in winter for women it was (p = 0.001). Further analysis of the data revealed that the full moon association was statistically significant only for premenopausal women, defined as female victims younger than 45 years of age. To explain this unexpected finding a number of factors were considered, e.g., the darkness of a northern Finnish winter with increases of SAD and depression especially in premenopausal women, the influence of the lunar periodicity on the menstrual cycle, and cosmogeophysical effects on the humoral and autonomous nervous system.