Analyses showed that adolescents who were older, had non-intact families, had fathers who were homemakers, had parents of a lower educational level, or had economically disadvantaged families, had a significantly higher level of suicidal ideation. Pearson correlation analyses showed that emotional competence, social problem solving, father-adolescent communication, mother-adolescent communication and family functioning were negatively related to adolescent suicidal ideation, while hopelessness was positively related to it. Regression analyses also showed that the above factors were significant predictors of adolescent suicidal ideation. / Based on a family ecological model, this study investigated personal factors (hopelessness, social problem solving, emotional competence) and family factors (parent-adolescent communication, family functioning) related to suicidal ideation among secondary school students in Hong Kong utilizing a cross-sectional survey design. A total of 5,928 self-administered questionnaires based on convenience sampling (male = 53.1%, female = 46.9%) were collected from 42 secondary schools on Hong Kong Island, in Kowloon and the New Territories. The participants were Form 1 to Form 4 students, with a mean age of 13.87. / The theoretical implications of the findings are that emotional competence, social problem solving, hopelessness, parent-adolescent communication and family functioning can be considered as key building blocks in the models of adolescent suicidal ideation. Practically speaking, enhancing emotional competence, social problem solving skills, sense of hope, quality of parent-adolescent communication and healthy family functioning with reference to the family ecological framework is important for preventing and treating adolescent suicidal ideation. Implications for policy development and social service delivery are further elaborated. In addition, limitations of the study are discussed and recommendations for further study are made. / Three types of causal models were tested in the study. In the direct effects model, hopelessness was the most important predictor among different correlates, followed by mother-adolescent communication, family functioning, social problem solving and father-adolescent communication, while emotional competence was the least important. In the mediating model, path analyses showed that hopelessness mediated the relationship between both personal and family correlates and adolescent suicidal ideation. In the moderating models, hierarchical regression analyses showed that mother-adolescent communication moderated the relationship between hopelessness and adolescent suicidal ideation. / "December 2007." / Adviser: Tan Lei Daniel Shek. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 69-08, Section: A, page: 3320. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 235-297). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. [Ann Arbor, MI] : ProQuest Information and Learning, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract in English and Chionese. / School code: 1307.

published_or_final_version / Sociology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

Thesis (M. A. (Clinical Psychology)) -- University of Limpopo, 2020 / Suicidal behaviour is a global health concern. The youth have been found to be at an exceptional risk in terms of suicidal behaviour due to a variety of problems that they encounter. Studies have been conducted to conceptualise suicidal behaviour. However, cultural aspects have often been neglected or marginalised. In Africa traditional healers play an important role in health care provision and the conceptualisation of problems encountered by the people. The present study was aimed at exploring how traditional healers conceptualise youth suicidal behaviour in Bakenberg, Limpopo Province. A qualitative exploratory method was utilised to execute the study. Study participants included ten traditional healers (six females and four males) aged between 35 and 85 years of age, who were selected using a snowball sampling method. A conversational method was used to collect data, employing semi-structured interview questions as a way of initiating conversations. The conversations were conducted in Sepedi and later translated into English. The study revealed that suicide is mainly understood to be multifaceted. Witchcraft, family problems, poor problem-solving skills, substance use, life difficulties and other secondary factors were all identified as central themes. The study revealed that suicide is a speciality within traditional healing, thus only those who are gifted and trained can assess or intervene. Ditaola (divination bones) and ancestral guidance were reported to be some of the means used to identify suicidal youth. The study also revealed that talk therapy (counselling) and herbal medicine „Molebatsa‟ were used as the main intervention methods. Herbal medicine is used as both a prevention and treatment of suicidal behaviour in youth. Thus it can prevent the occurrence of suicide or calm an individual who had a failed suicide attempt.

Thesis (MEd) -- Stellenbosch University, 1984. / In die loop van die afgelope aantal jare het die massamedia herhaaldelik - by wyse van koerantberigte, tydskrifartikels en aktualiteitsprogramme oor die radio en televisie - die verskynsel van selfmoord by volwassenes, adolessente en kinders onder die aandag gebring. Daar bestaan sterk aanduidings dat daar gedurende die afgelope aantal dekades wêreldwyd 'n beduidende toename in die voorkomssyfers van selfmoord en selfmoordpogings voorgekom het, en dat die syfers bo verwaging hoog kan wees.

Kwan Chi-fai. / "June 2000." / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2000. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 248-265). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [200-] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / Abstracts in English and Chinese.

This research utilized data concerning adolescents at imminent risk for harm confined to the Edmonton and Lethbridge secure treatment centres in Alberta. Once screened for inclusion criteria in a single stage, non-random convenience sampling protocol, 210 files were included in the study. From these files, the adolescents' psychopathological diagnoses, Suicide Probability Scale (SPS) scores as well as other demographic data (including age, gender, ethnicity and previous suicide attempts) were recorded. This research was designed to delineate the characteristics of adolescents admitted to secure treatment, examine the overall suicide risk in this sample, investigate the relationship between study variables via crosstabulation and chi-square analysis, and to determine which independent variable/s best predicted suicide risk via ANOVA and multiple lineear regression analysis. Analysis results indicated that the sample was predominantly comprised of female adolescents, Caucasian ethnicity and was aged between 13 and 15 years. The majority of adolescents with suicide history information available in their file had previously attempted suicide. Youth demonstrated an average of 2.7 psychopathological diagnoses, the most frequent of which were conduct disorder, substance abuse, depression, adjustment disorder and parent child relational disorder. The majority of youth were in the moderate suicide risk category from SPS scores. Multiple linear regression analysis determined that the diagnoses of adjustment disorder and depression were found to be predictive of increased suicide risk scores, as was gender (females had higher risk scores), age (younger adolescents had higher risk scores) and previous suicide attempts. Those in the "other" ethnicity category demonstrated lower suicide risk scores. / xi, 193 leaves ; 29 cm.

Research into the phenomenon of youth suicide is typically guided by quantitative methodologies focused on young people who have attempted or died by suicide. Questions related to epidemiology, etiology, and the development of actuarial measures of risk are often the drivers of these particular kinds of research. Similarly, research into school-based youth suicide prevention curricula is predominantly focused on quantitative measures of the degree to which young people acquire knowledge or change attitudes about suicide, after exposure to a delivered program. Grounded in post-structural ideas, the purpose of this thesis is to expand upon these mainstream inquiries into youth suicide prevention education through close exploration and analysis of how “suicide” is discursively produced within the context of a classroom delivered curriculum. This study will pay particular attention to the discursive productions of suicide in the curriculum, as well as how these productions result in the constitution of particular objects, concepts, and subjectivities. Transcripts of “naturally occurring classroom talk” will serve as the site of analysis. Troubling contemporary “truth regimes” about suicide and its prevention through close analysis of the discursive frames by which they are produced offers up the potential of re-imagining new possibilities for thinking about and delivering youth suicide prevention education.

Research into the phenomenon of youth suicide is typically guided by quantitative methodologies focused on young people who have attempted or died by suicide. Questions related to epidemiology, etiology, and the development of actuarial measures of risk are often the drivers of these particular kinds of research. Similarly, research into school-based youth suicide prevention curricula is predominantly focused on quantitative measures of the degree to which young people acquire knowledge or change attitudes about suicide, after exposure to a delivered program. Grounded in post-structural ideas, the purpose of this thesis is to expand upon these mainstream inquiries into youth suicide prevention education through close exploration and analysis of how “suicide” is discursively produced within the context of a classroom delivered curriculum. This study will pay particular attention to the discursive productions of suicide in the curriculum, as well as how these productions result in the constitution of particular objects, concepts, and subjectivities. Transcripts of “naturally occurring classroom talk” will serve as the site of analysis. Troubling contemporary “truth regimes” about suicide and its prevention through close analysis of the discursive frames by which they are produced offers up the potential of re-imagining new possibilities for thinking about and delivering youth suicide prevention education.

The purpose of this project was to explore perceptions of effective components in adolescent suicide prevention programs among San Bernardino school counselors. The stress model and the mental health model are the two models implemented in suicide prevention programs.

The present study compared the suicidal behaviour and related measures of adolescents in high school in Germany (N=318) and South Africa (N=299). Participants completed a series of self-report measures of the SPS (Suicide Probability Scale), PSS-Fa (Perceived Social Support From Family Scale), PSS-Fr (Perceived Social Support From Friends Scale), SIB (Scale Of Interpersonal Behaviour) and a number of demographic questions. Analyses were conducted using content analysis, correlation coefficients and logistic regression to determine variables related to previous suicide attempts, stepwise multiple regression to account for variables predicting currents suicidal risk; and multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) to examine differences among the groups and among suicide attempters and non-attempters. 36 German (11.3%) and 48 South African (16.1%) adolescents reported that they had made previous suicide attempts. German adolescents reported 45 (14.2%) suicide attempts in the family and 82 (25.8%) suicide attempts by friends. South African adolescents reported 43 (14.4%) suicide attempts in the family and 92 (30.7%) suicide attempts by friends. The following variables were associated with previous suicide attempts in the German sample: attempted suicide by friends, a life-threatening event, previous psychiatric contact, the death of a friend, low perceived family support, female gender, attempted suicide in the family, suicide of a friend, and low perceived friend support. The following variables were associated with previous suicide attempts in the South African sample: low perceived family support, death of a friend, attempted suicide by friends, female gender, a life-threatening event, previous psychiatric contact, suicide of friends, and attempted suicide in the family. The following variables for the German sample were found to be significant predictors of current suicidal risk: low perceived family and friend support, previous suicide attempts, suicide attempts in the family, a life-threatening event, suicide attempts of friends, suicide of friends, female gender, and previous psychiatric contact. The following variables for the South African sample were found to be significant predictors of current suicidal risk: previous suicide attempts, low perceived family and friend support, death of a friend, a life-threatening event, previous psychiatric contact, suicide attempts in the family, suicide of friends, and suicide attempts of friends. These findings show that suicidal behaviour is frequent in both countries. Suicidal deaths of friends and family is more prevalent in Germany, whereas religion or belief in god does not protect against suicide attempts in both countries. Results indicate that perceived support from family is a strong protective factor against suicide attempts. / Psychology / M.A. (Psychology)