Ability to recognize suicidal tendencies in adolescents by high school counselors

Abstract

The rise in adolescent suicide in the last 20 years has been alarming and of major concern to all working with this population. The recognition of suicidal signs in adolescents by high school counselors could provide a means of early intervention which could help prevent a needless death. The purpose of this project was to determine to what extent three groups of counselors could recognize suicidal signs in adolescents. The groups of counselors chosen for the study were regular education counselors, vocational counselors, and special education counselors in the Texas Public School System. A multiple choice instrument was constructed for this project designed to measure the ability to recognize suicidal behavior in adolescents. The questions for the survey were derived from a review of the literature on recent findings relevant to adolescent suicide. The original questions were administered to graduate level students at Sephen F. Austin State University and Sam Houston State University. These results were analyzed using the programs from the Analysis of Behavior Science Data statistical package, (Veldman, 1967). The survey was revised based on the item analysis and mailed to the counselors chosen for the study. Descriptive statistics demonstrated weaknesses in the counselors' ability to identify suicidal behaviors; however, an analysis of variance indicated no significant differences among the three groups of counselors.