Year: 1994 Source: New Directions for Child Development, no.64, (Summer 1994), p.55-70 SIEC No: 20010709

Adolescents attempt suicide at a rate far in excess of that reported for any other age group. This chapter attempts to find a developmental means of accounting for this epidemiological fact. This dramatic spiking in the incidence of self-destructive behaviours is linked to the routine difficulties young people encounter in working out age-appropriate ways of vouchsafing their own continuity through time. Extending on findings from a previous study, new evidence is introduced demonstrating that even temporary loss of the narrative thread of one’s personal persistence can leave some adolescents especially vulnerable to a range of self-destructive impulses against which others remain better insulated. (30 refs.)