The risk of dying by suicide may be influenced by the city you live in, according to a recent study.

Researchers at Rice University and the University of Colorado at Boulder found that adults living in cities with more socio-economic disadvantages and fewer families living together have higher odds of suicidal death than adults living in less-disadvantaged cities and cities with more families living together.

"Many people see suicide as an inherently individual act," researcher Justin Denney, an assistant professor of sociology at Rice and director of the Urban Health Program, part of Rice's Kinder Institute for Urban Research, said in a statement. "However, our research suggests that it is an act that can be heavily influenced by broader socio-economic and family factors."

For the two-part study, researchers analyzed data from the National Institutes of Health's National Health Interview Survey, which includes health data of more than a million adults living in the U.S. between 1986 and 2003. However, they focused exclusively on population areas with more than 50,000 residents.

Results from the first part of the study showed that respondents living in cities with a higher percentage of family households demonstrated a lower risk of suicide than did respondents in cities where more residents lived alone or with unrelated friends.

The second part of the study showed that after statistical adjustments for educational attainment, household income and employment, survey respondents who lived in more socio-economically disadvantaged cities experienced a higher likelihood of death by suicide.

"Thankfully, suicide is a relatively rare cause of death." Denney said. "But finding that the characteristics of the places we live can influence how long we live and how we die is an important consideration in addressing health disparities in the United States."

The findings are detailed in the latest edition of Social Science Quarterly.