This article discusses the role of educators in suicide prevention. First, the incidence of adolescent suicide in the United States is discussed. Next, case laws related to suicide in educational settings are reviewed. Court rulings indicate that educators can be found negligent in cases involving suicide only if the court finds that they owed a…

The Foundation for Child Development Child and Youth Well-Being Index Project at Duke University issues an annual comprehensive measure of how children are faring in the United States. The Child Well-Being Index (CWI) is based on a composite of 28 "Key Indicators" of wellbeing that are grouped into seven "Quality-of-Life/Well-Being…

The U.S. Department of Education's Higher Education Center for Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse and Violence Prevention has developed this annotated bibliography to provide those interested in prevention at colleges and universities--and in surrounding communities--with a ready reference of current, important, and available information resources.…

Many researchers have called for educational leaders to develop a moral grounding for their work. This essay begins a discussion of how Starratt's (2005) spiraling framework of moral responsibility represents a process through which educational leaders can evolve from taking a transactional approach to problem solving, to using moral and…

Purpose: This study used epidemiological data of older African Americans and Caucasians living in an urban community to compare those factors associated with active or passive suicidal ideation in each racial group. Design and Methods: Using 1990 census data for Brooklyn, New York, we attempted to interview all cognitively intact adults aged 55 or…

Ethnic groups differ in rates of suicidal behaviors among youths, the context within which suicidal behavior occurs (e.g., different precipitants, vulnerability and protective factors, and reactions to suicidal behaviors), and patterns of help-seeking. In this article, the authors discuss the cultural context of suicidal behavior among African…

The present study utilizes the National College Health Risk Behavior Survey to examine the relationship between health-risk behaviors and sexual victimization among a sample of college women. A prospective design is utilized to examine the relationship between health-risk behaviors as measured at baseline and sexual victimization during a 3-month…

This state-of-the-art practitioner resource and course text provides a comprehensive view of adolescent development and spells out effective ways to help teens who are having difficulties. The book illuminates protective and risk factors in the many contexts of adolescents' lives, from individual attributes to family, school, neighborhood, and…

The issue of whether suicide can be a good death was separated into two different questions: (1) can suicide be an appropriate death, and (2) can suicide be a rational death? Several definitions of an "appropriate" death were proposed, and suicide was seen as potentially appropriate. Similarly, several criteria for rationality were proposed and…

Social workers provide services to populations with mental health issues, including suicidal ideations and are thus at risk of experiencing a client suicide at some point during their career. Limited research using quantitative methods has explored the effect of client suicide on social workers, but little is known about their reactions from a…

In this study, the authors investigated the efficacy of the Youth-Nominated Support Team-Version 1 (YST-1), a psychoeducational social network intervention, with 289 suicidal, psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents (197 girls, 92 boys). Adolescents were randomly assigned to treatment-as-usual plus YST-1 or treatment-as-usual only. Assessments…

During a pre-suicide state, the enactment of a suicide fantasy is the motive force. The nature and function of a suicide fantasy is explored in this paper in the context of the impact of puberty on the female body image and against the background of the pre-Oedipal and Oedipal father's relationship with his daughter. Case material from the…

To test the hypothesis that higher levels of optimism reduce the association between hopelessness and suicidal ideation, 284 college students completed self-report measures of optimism and Beck scales for hopelessness, suicidal ideation, and depression. A statistically significant interaction between hopelessness and one measure of optimism was…

Building upon previous exploratory qualitative research (Kidd S.A. (2003) "Child Adol. Social Work J." 20(4):235-261), this paper examines the mental health implications of social stigma as it is experienced by homeless youth. Surveys conducted with 208 youths on the streets and in agencies in New York City and Toronto revealed…

We report the case of attempted suicide by a 30-year-old man who had significant cognitive deficits that developed after at least three years of polysubstance use with cannabis, methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, "ecstasy") and cocaine. The patient reported increasing difficulties in his professional and interpersonal life which may have been…