Emotion Regulation Difficulties Youth–Adult Relat

Authors: Anthony R Pisani Peter A Wyman Mariya Petrova Karen SchmeelkCone David B Goldston Yinglin Xia Madelyn S Gould

Publish Date: 2012/12/18

Volume: 42, Issue: 6, Pages: 807-820

PDF Link

Abstract

To develop and refine interventions to prevent youth suicide knowledge is needed about specific processes that reduce risk at a population level Using a crosssectional design the present study tested hypotheses regarding associations between selfreported suicide attempts emotion regulation difficulties and positive youth–adult relationships among 7978 highschool students 486  male 499  female in 30 high schools from predominantly rural lowincome communities 683 students 86  reported a pastyear suicide attempt Emotion regulation difficulties and a lack of trusted adults at home and school were associated with increased risk for making a pastyear suicide attempt above and beyond the effects of depressive symptoms and demographic factors The association between emotion regulation difficulties and suicide attempts was modestly lower among students who perceived themselves as having higher levels of trusted adults in the family consistent with a protective effect Having a trusted adult in the community outside of school and family was associated with fewer suicide attempts in models that controlled only for demographic covariates but not when taking symptoms of depression into account These findings point to adolescent emotion regulation and relationships with trusted adults as complementary targets for suicide prevention that merit further intervention studies Reaching these targets in a broad population of adolescents will require new delivery systems and “option rich” OR intervention designsThe authors wish to thank Caitlyn Eberle and Jane Fitzgerald for their help collecting data and preparing tables for this manuscript and William Morrison for proofreading our final drafts We gratefully acknowledge support from the National Institute of Mental Health R01MH091452 K24MH066252 the University of Rochester CTSA award number KL2 RR024136 from the National Center for Research Resources and the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences of the National Institutes of Health New York StateOffice of Mental Health and the Locker Family Fund The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health or any of our other fundersAP conceived of the study conducted most analyses and drafted the manuscript PW led the trial from which data are generated and participated at all stages of study design analysis interpretation and manuscript preparation MP helped to recruit schools coordinated the study and supervised data collection entry and cleaning KSC managed data conducted preliminary analysis and assisted with analytic interpretation DG assisted interpretation of findings and helped to draft the manuscript YX reviewed analyses and assisted in interpretation MG contributed to the study design and manuscript preparation All authors read and approved the final manuscript

Keywords: