The impact of stressors on second generation Indian residential school survivors.

From 1863 to 1996, many Aboriginal children in Canada were forced to attend Indian Residential Schools (IRSs), where many experienced neglect, abuse, and the trauma of separation from their families and culture. The present study examined the intergenerational impact of IRS exposure on depressive symptomatology in a convenience sample of 143 First Nations adults. IRS […]

Insight into the stigma of suicide loss survivors: Factor analyses of family stereotypes, prejudices, and discriminations.

Families of individuals who die by suicide report public stigma that threatens their well-being. This study used a community-based participatory (CBPR) approach to describe a factor structure for the family stigma of suicide. Candidate items (n = 82) from a previous qualitative study were presented in an online survey format. Members of the public (n = 232) indicated how […]

Experiencing racial microaggressions influences suicide ideation through perceived burdensomeness in African Americans.

Racial microaggressions are a contemporary form of subtle discrimination that occur in everyday exchanges, and are associated with a variety of negative mental health outcomes, including suicide ideation. Previous work (e.g., Torres-Harding, Andrade, & Romero Diaz, 2012) has identified 6 dimensions of racial microaggressions: invisibility, criminality, low-achieving/undesirable culture, sexualization, foreigner/not belonging, and environmental invalidations. The […]

Appraisals of discriminatory events among adult offspring of Indian Residential School survivors: The influences of identity centrality and past perceptions of discrimination.

As part of a government policy of assimilation beginning in the mid-1800s, a large proportion of Aboriginal children in Canada were forcibly removed from their homes to attend Indian Residential Schools (IRSs), a practice which continued into the 1990s. This traumatic experience had lasting negative effects not only on those who attended but also on […]

Childhood adversity, perceived discrimination, and coping strategies in relation to depressive symptoms among First Nations adults in Canada: The moderating role of unsupportive social interactions from ingroup and outgroup members.

Aboriginal peoples are at greater risk of experiencing early life adversity relative to non-Aboriginal peoples in Canada, and as adults frequently experience high levels of discrimination that act as a further stressor. Although these factors appear to contribute to high rates of depressive disorders and suicidality in Aboriginal peoples, the psychosocial factors that contribute to […]

Acculturative stress, perceived discrimination, and vulnerability to suicide attempts among emerging adults.

Cultural factors are often neglected in studies of suicidal behavior among emerging adults. The present study examined acculturative stress and perceived discrimination as statistical predictors of a suicide attempt history among an ethnically diverse sample of 969 emerging adults, ages 18-25 ( M = 18.8). Females made up 68% of the sample, and the racial/ethnic […]

Assessment of awareness of connectedness as a culturally-based protective factor for Alaska native youth.

Research with Native Americans has identified connectedness as a culturally based protective factor against substance abuse and suicide. Connectedness refers to the interrelated welfare of the individual, one’s family, one’s community, and the natural environment. We developed an 18-item quantitative assessment of awareness of connectedness and tested it with 284 Alaska Native youth. Evaluation with […]

Immigration, suicidal ideation and deliberate self-injury in the Boston Youth Survey 2006.

The prevalence and immigration-related correlates of deliberate self-injury (DSI) and suicidal ideation (SI) were estimated in a sample of Boston public high school students in 2006. Compared with U.S.-born youth, immigrant youth were not at increased risk for DSI or SI, even if they had experienced discrimination due to their ancestry. By contrast, U.S.-born youth […]

Moderation effects of perfectionism and discrimination on interpersonal factors and suicide ideation.

This study examined the moderating effects of 3 risk factors-perfectionistic personal discrepancy, perfectionistic family discrepancy, and discrimination-on the associations between interpersonal risk factors (i.e., perceived burdensomeness and thwarted belongingness) and suicide ideation in a sample of 466 Asian international students studying in the United States. We focused specifically on perceived discrimination and maladaptive perfectionism as […]