Measurement choices for youth suicidality
Abstract
Suicide is among the leading causes of death among individuals ages 10-24, making suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STBs) a serious public health crisis among youth. Suicide risk screening and assessment are vital to addressing this public health crisis. In fact, many youths that screen positive for suicidal ideation do not have known mental health concerns and would have been missed if not asked directly. Medical settings are an optimal setting to detect suicidality early and provide appropriate follow-up monitoring and care as needed. To support effective and efficient screening and assessment of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, providers must choose measures with both strong psychometric properties and clinical utility. While measurement of STBs can vary across health settings, suicide risk screening and assessment typically involves gathering information about current suicidal ideation, suicidal behaviors, and suicidal plans via self-report questionnaires, clinical interviews, and/or computerized adaptive screens. In alignment with measurement-based care efforts, the current manuscript will provide a scoping review of measures of youth suicidal ideation, behavior, plans, and their risk factors. Specifically, the psychometric properties, clinical utility, and other key considerations for screening and assessment of adolescent suicide risk are discussed.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Commonly used assessment tools in pediatric primary care include the ASQ-BSSA, C-SSRS, and SAFE-T.
“Commonly used assessment tools in pediatric primary care include the ASQ-Brief Suicide Safety Assessment (BSSA), Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale (C-SSRS), and the Suicide Assessment Five-Step Evaluation and Triage (SAFE-T).47”
From Evidence-based youth suicide prevention and intervention in pediatric primary care settings. (2024) · cites this paper as [47]
Contextual factors have potentially differential implications for diagnosis and treatment in youth of color and minoritized youth who may experience poorer or delayed access to care.
“These contextual factors have potentially differential implications for diagnosis and treatment in youth of color and minoritized youth who may experience poorer or delayed access to care.47,51”
From Evidence-based youth suicide prevention and intervention in pediatric primary care settings. (2024) · cites this paper as [47]
There are no psychometric validation studies of the BSSA at this time, though providers have reported the approach is acceptable.
“There are no psychometric validation studies of the BSSA at this time, though providers have reported this approach is acceptable.47-49”
From Evidence-based youth suicide prevention and intervention in pediatric primary care settings. (2024) · cites this paper as [47]
Following a positive screen, assessment is a comprehensive evaluation typically conducted by a medical provider or mental health clinician to obtain specific information about risk and protective factors and guide next steps.
“Following a positive screen, assessment is a comprehensive evaluation, typically conducted by a medical provider or mental health clinician, to obtain more specific information about risk and protective factors, including diagnostic and psychosocial considerations, to guide next steps.46,47”
From Evidence-based youth suicide prevention and intervention in pediatric primary care settings. (2024) · cites this paper as [47]
The C-SSRS has demonstrated convergent validity with established suicidal ideation and behavior scales and strong divergent validity with depression scales.
“The C-SSRS has demonstrated convergent validity with established suicidal ideation and behavior scales and strong divergent validity with depression scales.47”
From Evidence-based youth suicide prevention and intervention in pediatric primary care settings. (2024) · cites this paper as [47]
The citation lists haven’t been fetched yet
References 90 · Cited by 8
- Authors
- Busby, D. R., Hughes, J. L., Walters, M., Ihediwa, A., Adeniran, M., Goodman, L., & Mayes, T. L.
- Affiliations
- The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (US)
- Nationwide Children's Hospital (US)
- The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (US)
- Corresponding author
- Busby, Danielle R.
- ORCID
- Venue
- Child Psychiatry & Human Development
- Published
- 2023-12-26
- Volume
- 56
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1250-1266
- ISSN
- 0009-398X (ISSN-L)
- 1573-3327
- OpenAlex
- W4390236171
- Cited by
- 8
- References
- 90
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 2
- FWCI
- 0.40
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- Locations
- Child Psychiatry & Human Development (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Suicide and Self-Harm Studies
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Management Science and Operations Research › Psychometric Methodologies and Testing
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health via Writing
- Keywords
- youth suicidality, suicidal ideation, suicidal behavior, suicide planning, suicide risk screening, suicide risk assessment, measurement instruments, psychometric properties, clinical utility, measurement-based care, adolescents, suicide risk factors
- MeSH terms
- Suicide Prevention, Adolescent, Child, Humans, Mass Screening, Psychometrics, Risk Factors, Suicide, Risk Assessment, Young Adult, Suicidal Ideation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
