The Prospective Association between Emotional Reactivity and Adolescent Suicidal Ideation

Abstract

Despite the importance of emotions in our daily lives, less is known about the role of emotional reactivity in suicidal risk. This brief study investigated whether emotional reactivity is associated with adolescent suicidal ideation six months later. Participants were 139 adolescents (55% female; M_age = 12.79, SD_age = 0.73) who completed baseline assessments, a 10-day daily diary protocol, and six-month follow-up assessments. Results showed that higher emotional reactivity indicated by increased negative emotions and decreased positive emotions was associated with a greater risk for suicidal ideation. The findings suggest that adolescents with greater emotional reactivity to daily school problems had elevated risks for suicidal ideation. This study supports the importance of emotional reactivity in daily life for preventing adolescent suicidal ideation.

Keywords:

• Daily diary
• eadolescent
• motional reactivity
• suicidal ideation

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT

The data are not available due to ethical concerns.

ETHICAL CONSIDERATION

The study was approved and followed by the Institutional Review Board of the National Chengchi University (NCCU-REC-202105-I038). The study is in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Additional information

Funding

Data collection was supported by the Taiwan Ministry of Science and Technology under Grant MOST 110-2410-H-004 − 109. MOST had no role in the study design, collection, analysis, or interpretation of the data, writing the manuscript, or the decision to submit the paper for publication. Shou-Chun Chiang was supported by the Prevention and Methodology Training Program (T32 DA017629; MPIs: J. Maggs & S. Lanza) with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse [T32 DA017629]. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institute on Drug Abuse or the National Institutes of Health.

Notes on contributors

Shou-Chun Chiang

Shou-Chun Chiang, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, The Pennsylvania State University.

Wan-Chen Chen

Wan-Chen Chen, Department of Education, National Chengchi University.

Li-Tuan Chou

Li-Tuan Chou, Department Human Development and Family Studies, National Taiwan Normal University.