Methods: Seven questions were added to the self-report Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) asking about perceived emotional self-efficacy (preventing nervousness, controlling feelings, suppressing unpleasant thoughts, etc.) and suicide ideation and behavior during the past 12 months (feeling sad for 2+weeks, seriously considered suicide, planned a suicide attempt, and made a suicide attempt). Unadjusted and adjusted logistic regression analysis and multivariate models constructed separately for sex and race was employed. Tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine use (past 30 days); relationship violence (past 12 months), and weapon or gun access (past 30 days) were included as covariates in the adjusted models.
Results: The alpha coefficient for the ESE scale in this study was acceptable at .85. All of the suicide ideation and behavior variables were significantly related to ESE in the unadjusted models. In the adjusted models, results suggest males and black females who reported feeling sad for 2+ weeks, seriously considered suicide, planned a suicide attempt, or made a suicide attempt were at significantly greater odds to report low ESE when compared to those who reported high ESE (p<.01). No findings were significant for white females.
Conclusions: Results have implications for community- and school-based mental health services and suicide prevention programs for adolescents. Measures of ESE as a part of adolescent mental health assessments might be useful for field work, intervention, and program evaluation efforts for males and black females, and to a lesser extent for white females.
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