Suicide in Children: Predictive Factors

Paper Summary:

The first part of this paper examines the current research investigating predictors of suicide in young people. To this end, three categories of suicide predictor research are examined: studies using clinical samples; studies using non-clinical samples; and studies comparing predictors of clinical and non-clinical samples. The second part of this paper examines both one tragic youth who committed suicide in front of his classmates as well as the issues faced by youth suicide in one major county. The review ends with the formulation of several conclusions concerning factors that assist in predicting suicide risk in young people.

From the Paper:

"What variables place children and adolescents at risk for suicide? Some researchers have searched for the answer to this question by investigating clinical samples. In one such study, Lipschitz, Winegar, Nicholoau, Hartnick, Wolfson and Southwick (1999) assessed suicide risk in 34 boys and 37 girls who were inpatients in psychiatric hospitals.
About 51 percent of sample patients had attempted suicide. Findings of the study indicated that those who had attempted suicide were significantly more likely to be female, to report sexual, physical, and emotional abuse, and to, themselves, endorse emotional neglect as a method of rearing children. In an effort to determine the magnitude of the different effects exerted by predictor variables, Lipschitz et. al (1999) conducted a multivariate analysis, which revealed that female gender, sexual abuse, and emotional neglect remained significant predictors of both self-mutilation behavior and suicidal ideation. Based on these findings, Lipschitz and associates concluded that emotional neglect was one of the more powerful predictors of suicidal behavior in hospitalized adolescents than physical abuse, emotional abuse, and physical neglect."

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