Suicidality and non-suicidal self-injury: A narrative review of measurement, risk, and disparities among minoritized and system-involved youth in the USA

Suicidality and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) among youth in the United States continue to be a growing and serious public health concern. With alarming rates of suicide trending in the wrong direction, researchers are committed to bending the curve of suicide and reducing rates by 2025. Understanding the antecedents and conditions, existing measures, and disparate prevalence […]

The intersections between sexual orientation, Latine ethnicity, social determinants of health, and lifetime suicide attempts in a sample being assessed for entry to co-occurring mental health and substance use disorder treatment

Purpose: Few studies have examined the relationship between the intersections of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) sexual orientation, Latine ethnicity, and lifetime suicide attempts in Latine individuals with substance use disorder. This study examines this intersection and controls for social determinants of health, mental health disorder symptoms, and substance use disorder symptoms in a sample […]

Informing equitable prevention practices: A statewide disaggregated analysis of suicide for ethnoracially minoritized adolescents

The increase in adolescent suicide rates in the United States is a pervasive public health issue, and ethnoracial youth with diverse identities are disproportionately impacted, yet less studied. National planning efforts reinforce state-level approaches to suicide prevention through an equitable lens to prevent adolescent suicide. This study examined disaggregated state-level data over time to determine […]

Understanding LGBTQA+SB suicidal behaviour and improving support: Insight from intersectional lived experience

To facilitate better policy and service responses to LGBTIQA+ suicidal behaviour in Australia, this project has two aims: 1. To generate new insights into lived experiences of suicidal behaviour within LGBTIQA+ communities, including First Nations LGBTIQA+SB people and LGBTIQA+POC in Australia. 2.To better understand the factors that influence and protect against suicidal behaviour in LGBTIQA+SB […]

Intersectional prevalence of suicide ideation, plan, and attempt based on gender, sexual orientation, race and ethnicity, and rurality

Importance: Suicidal thoughts and behaviors (STBs) are major public health problems, and some social groups experience disproportionate STB burden. Studies assessing STB inequities for single identities (eg, gender or sexual orientation) cannot evaluate intersectional differences and do not reflect that the causes of inequities are due to structural-level (vs individual-level) processes. Objective: To examine differences in STB […]

An integrated conceptual model to understand suicidality among queer youth to inform suicide prevention

In this article, we apply and combine elements from four theoretical frameworks (i.e., Minority Stress Theory, Person-in-Environment and Risk and Resilience Framework, Interpersonal-Psychological Theory of Suicide, and Intersectionality) to explain the problem of queer youth suicide through our integrated conceptual model, Queer Prevention of Youth Suicidality Model (Queer-PRYSM). The need for this conceptual model is […]

Language, culture, gender, and intersectionalities in suicide theory, research, and prevention: Challenges and changes

Over the decades suicidology has experienced many challenges and changes. Language, culture, gender, and intersectionalities of experience have been domains of challenge and change. In this article I document my contributions to suicidology’s transformation in these domains. These contributions include challenging stigmatizing and biased suicide-language (e.g., expressions like “successful” and “failed” suicide); questioning gender myths […]

Understanding suicide risk for youth who are both Black and Native American: The role of intersectionality and multiple marginalization

Introduction Native American and multiracial youth experience elevated risk for suicide ideation (SI) and suicide attempts (SA); however, intersectional identities are often unexamined in suicide research. Method We examined the prevalence of SI and SA, and the impact of intersectional identities (sex, sexual minority identity, and economic insecurity) on these rates, in 496 biracial Black-Native […]

Intersectionality in pandemic youth suicide attempt trends

Introduction The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in increased distress at a societal level, with youth and young people bearing a disproportionate burden. A series of recent Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports has highlighted emergency department (ED) visit rates for suicide attempts among youth ages 12–25 during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study expands those analyses by […]

Syndemic relationship of depressive symptoms, substance use, and suicidality in transgender youth: A cross‑sectional study using the U.S. youth risk behavior surveillance system

Purpose Syndemics are co-occurring epidemics that cluster within populations due to shared socio-structural factors and are often in populations with intersecting forms of vulnerability. Suicide, depression, and substance use all disproportionately affect transgender and gender diverse (TGD) youth. In this study, we test a syndemic model of the relationship between these three mental health conditions […]

Ethnic and sexual identity-related inequalities in adolescent health and well-being in a national population-based study

Purpose: This study employed an intersectional framework to examine impact of inequalities related to sexual minority (SM) and ethnic minority (EM) identities in risk for health, well-being, and health-related behaviors in a nationally representative sample. Methods: Participants included 9789 (51% female) adolescents aged 17 years from the U.K.-wide Millennium Cohort Study, with data on self-identified sexual and […]

Towards a sociological understanding of medical gaslighting in western health care

In recent years, the term ‘medical gaslighting’ and accompanying accounts of self- identified women experiencing invalidation, dismissal and inadequate care have proliferated in the media. Gaslighting has primarily been conceptualized in the field of psychology as a phenomenon within interpersonal relationships. Following the work of Paige Sweet (American Sociological Review, 84, 2019, 851), I argue […]

Recent suicide attempts across multiple social identities among gay and bisexual men: An intersectionality analysis

This study draws from intersectionality to describe variations in recent suicide attempts (RSA) among gay and bisexual men (GBM) across sociodemographics. Using survey data, logistic regression modeling explored RSA in two analytical stages: (1) the individual effects of each sociodemographic were measured; (2) two-way interaction terms between sociodemographics were tested and added to the models […]

Racial/ethnic, sex, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic disparities in suicidal trajectories and mental health treatment among adolescents transitioning to young adulthood in the USA: A population-based cohort study

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for people aged 10-34 years old. Limited research has documented extant heterogeneities in suicide across the life course and among diverse sociodemographic groups. There is also limited research on the influences of mental health utilization on suicidal trajectories across the life course. This study aims to: (1) […]

Intersecting identities and nonsuicidal self-injury among youth

Recent research suggests that intersecting marginalized identities may be important in explaining suicide-related mental health disparities. However, inconsistent findings have emerged regarding nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI). Guided by an intersectionality framework, we examined relations between identity and NSSI using a representative sample of 8th through 12th graders from Utah (N = 49,425). The independent influence of sexual orientation, […]

Toward an intersectional approach in developmental science: The role of race, gender, sexual orientation, and immigrant status.

Developmental theory and research have often focused on a single social identity category, for example, race or sexual orientation, and examined the consequences of that category on life outcomes. Yet intersectional models of social disadvantage (eg, Cole, 2009; Crenshaw, 1995; King, 1988) suggest that social categories combine to shape the experiences and life outcomes of […]

Expanding our paradigms: Intersectional and socioecological approaches to suicide prevention

Despite increasing research on suicide, we continue to see rising rates, particularly among youth. In answering recent calls for critical suicidology and transdisciplinary approaches to research, I discuss expanding beyond the paradigmatic confines of suicidology by proposing two related approaches to improve our science: intersectionality theory and socioecological theory. Following a discussion of social identity […]