Measuring the Suicidal Mind: Implicit Cognition Predicts Suicidal Behavior

The authors measured implicit associations about death/suicide in 157 people seeking treatment at a psychiatric emergency department. Results confirmed that people who have attempted suicide hold a significantly stronger implicit association between death/suicide & self than do psychiatrically distressed individuals who have not attempted suicide. Moreover, the implicit association of death/suicide with self was associated with an approximately 6-fold increase in the odds of making a suicide attempt in the next 6 months, exceeding the predictive validity of known risk factors & both patients’ & clinicians’ predictions. Results provide the first evidence of a behavioural marker for suicidal behaviour & suggest measures of implicit cognition may be useful for detecting & predicting sensitive clinical behaviours that are unlikely to be reported. (30 refs.)