Suicide rates among Indian youth in the United States are two to three times the national average. Although researchers have identified related risk and protective factors, they have limited understanding of the perspectives of youth at risk. In this descriptive, ethnographic study in a Pacific Northwest tribe, the goal was to gain an understanding of the life experiences of the youth. Focus gr...

Self-determination was examined as a protective factor against the detrimental impact of negative life events on suicide ideation in adolescents. It is postulated that for highly self-determined adolescents, negative life events have a weaker impact on both hopelessness and suicide ideation than for non-self-determined adolescents. In turn, hopelessness is hypothesized to generate less suicide ...

Despite the high prevalence of stress exposure healthy adaptation or resilience is a common response. Theoretical work and recent empirical evidence suggest that a robust reward system, in part, supports healthy adaptation by preserving positive emotions even under exceptionally stressful circumstances. We tested this prediction by examining empirical relations among behavioral and self-reporte...

The aging of the population is a worldwide phenomenon, and studying age-related diseases has become a relevant issue from both a scientific and a public health perspective. This review summarises the major findings concerning prevention of Alzheimer's disease (AD) and other dementias from a population-based study, the Kungsholmen Project. The study addresses risk- and protective factors for AD ...

Two studies examined racial identity (RI) as a protective factor against substance use cognitions among African American young adults who either envisioned or experienced racial discrimination. In Study 1, participants envisioned a discrimination or nondiscrimination scenario, and then their willingness to use drugs and an indirect measure of substance use were assessed. Discrimination was asso...

Existing research on the effects of children's exposure to violence covers a broad range of community, family, and media violence. This research is relevant and useful to an examination of domestic violence in two key ways. First, understanding how exposure to various types of violence affects children and what best enables them to cope can point to important considerations when trying to help ...

BACKGROUND  Studies have identified employment as a protective factor against suicide. We examined employment status and risk of suicide in Ireland during the 11-year period 1996-2006, a period of economic boom commonly known as the Celtic Tiger.  METHODS  Data relating to the 5270 suicides and 789 deaths of undetermined intent registered as occurring in Ireland in 1996-2006 and relevant popu...

BACKGROUND The concept of resilience has captured the imagination of researchers and policy makers over the past two decades. However, despite the ever growing body of resilience research, there is a paucity of relevant, comprehensive measurement tools. In this article, the development of a theoretically based, comprehensive multi-dimensional measure of resilience in adolescents is described. ...

OBJECTIVES Relationship dynamics influence the perception of HIV risk in sexual dyads. The objective of this study was to examine the effect of relational dynamics on knowledge or perception of a partner's HIV status in a sample of most at-risk men who have sex with men (MSM): drug-using male sex workers. The study identified relationship dimensions and examined their association with mispercep...

Resilience is a construct of increasing interest, but validated scales measuring resilience factors among adults are scarce. Here, a scale named the Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA) was crossvalidated and compared with measures of personality (Big Five/5PFs), cognitive abilities (Raven's Advanced Matrices, Vocabulary, Number series), and social intelligence (TSIS). All measures were given to 4...