Cited by 54Suicide and Self-Harm StudiesDeath Anxiety and Social ExclusionMental Health via Writing

Implicit identification with death predicts change in suicide ideation during psychiatric treatment in adolescents

Open access
Glenn, Catherine R., Kleiman, Evan M., Coppersmith, Daniel D.L., Santee, Angela C., Esposito, Erika C., Cha, Christine B., Nock, Matthew K., Auerbach, Randy P.·2017·Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry

Abstract

Background: Suicidal thoughts and behaviors are major public health concerns in youth. Unfortunately, knowledge of reliable predictors of suicide risk in adolescents is limited. Promising research using a death stimuli version of the Implicit Association Test (Death IAT) indicates that stronger identification with death differs between adults with and without a history of suicidal thoughts and behaviors and uniquely predicts suicide ideation and behavior. However, research in adolescents is lacking and existing findings have been mixed. This study extends previous research by testing whether implicit identification with death predicts changes in suicide ideation during psychiatric treatment in adolescents. Methods: Participants included 276 adolescents, ages 13–19, admitted to a short‐term residential treatment program. At hospital admission and discharge, adolescents completed the Death IAT and measures of recent suicidal thoughts. Results: At admission, implicit identification with death was associated with recent suicide ideation, but did not differ between those who engaged in prior suicidal behavior and those who did not. Prospectively, adolescents' implicit identification with death at admission significantly predicted their suicide ideation severity at discharge, above and beyond explicit suicide ideation. However, this effect only was significant for adolescents with longer treatment stays (i.e., more than 13 days). Conclusions: Implicit identification with death predicts suicidal thinking among adolescents in psychiatric treatment. Findings clarify over what period of time implicit cognition about death may predict suicide risk in adolescents.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/jcpp.12769

Cites

39 of 39 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

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?

  • The finding of a stronger self-death/suicide association among those with a prior suicide attempt has since been replicated in various samples.

    “These findings have since been replicated in various samples (Barnes et al., 2017; Glenn et al., 2017).”

    From Toward objective characterizations of suicide risk: A narrative review of laboratory-based cognitive and behavioral tasks (2023) · cites this paper as Glenn et al., 2017

    The Results section reports that adolescents with a prior suicide attempt did not show significantly stronger implicit identification with death than adolescents who had considered suicide but never attempted (p=.76). The Discussion likewise states that there were no differences based on previous suicidal behavior. This paper therefore does not replicate the finding attributed to it. (LLM, conf=0.90)

    Checked by a reasoning model — may be wrong.

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
  • Self-associations with death/suicide have been found to prospectively predict a future suicide attempt.

    “Self-associations with death/suicide have been found to prospectively predict a future suicide attempt (Barnes et al., 2017; Ellis et al., 2016; Glenn et al., 2017; Nock & Banaji, 2007; Nock et al., 2010; Tello et al., 2020).”
  • The death/suicide IAT has predicted suicidal behavior in some prospective studies but not in others.

    “The IAT predicts suicidal behavior in some prospective studies (269, 270), but not others (271).”

    From A brain-centric model of suicidal behavior (2020) · cites this paper as [271]

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Glenn, C. R., Kleiman, E. M., Coppersmith, D. D. L., Santee, A. C., Esposito, E. C., Cha, C. B., Nock, M. K., & Auerbach, R. P.
Affiliations
  • University of Rochester (US)
  • Harvard University (US)
  • Columbia University (US)
Corresponding author
Glenn, Catherine R.
Venue
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2017-07-04
Volume
58
Issue
12
Pages
1319-1329
ISSN
  • 0021-9630 (ISSN-L)
  • 1469-7610
OpenAlex
W2733755915
Cited by
54
References
39
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 7 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 1
FWCI
7.44
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
Funders
  • National Institute of Mental Health (F32MH097354, K23MH097786)
  • Klingenstein Third Generation Foundation
  • Tommy Fuss Fund
  • John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Suicide and Self-Harm Studies
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Mental Health via Writing
Keywords
suicidal ideation, adolescents, suicide risk prediction, psychiatric residential treatment, treatment duration, suicidal behavior
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adolescent Behavior, Adult, Attitude to Death, Female, Humans, Male, Patient Admission, Patient Discharge, Residential Treatment, Suicide, Attempted, 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