Mars B, et al. - Researchers in this work aim to identify factors which differentiate adolescents who attempt suicide from those who experience suicidal ideation but do not act on these thoughts. They observe that the extent of exposure to self-harm in others and the presence of psychiatric disorder most clearly distinguish adolescents who attempt suicide from those who only experience suicidal ideation.

Methods

• In this study, researchers included 4,772 members of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), a UK population-based birth cohort.
• Via self-report questionnaire, they assessed suicide ideation and attempts at age 16 years.
• They utilized multinomial regression to investigate associations between factors that differentiated adolescents in three groups: no suicidal ideation or attempts, suicidal ideation only and suicide attempts.
• On an imputed data set based on those with complete outcome data (suicidal thoughts and attempts) at age 16 years (N = 4,772), analysis was conducted.

Results

• In the sample, the lifetime prevalence of suicidal ideation and attempts was 9.6% and 6.8% respectively.
• Compared to adolescents who had experienced suicidal ideation, those who attempted suicide seemed reporting exposure to self-harm in others more frequently (adjusted OR for family member self-harm: 1.95, for friend self-harm: 2.61 and for both family and friend self-harm: 5.26).
• Adolescents who attempted suicide more frequently had a psychiatric disorder (adjusted OR for depression: 3.63; adjusted OR for anxiety disorder: 2.20; adjusted OR for behavioural disorder: 2.90).
• Female gender, lower IQ, higher impulsivity, higher intensity seeking, lower conscientiousness, a greater number of life events, body dissatisfaction, hopelessness, smoking and illicit drug use (excluding cannabis) were the other risk factors.