Initial Validation of Brief Measures of Suicide Risk Factors: Common Data Elements Used by the Military Suicide Research Consortium

Publication Date

6-1-2018

Document Type

Article

Organizational Units

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences, Psychology

Keywords

Military, Suicide, Risk assessment, Suicidal ideation, Suicidal behavior

Abstract

The Military Suicide Research Consortium (MSRC) developed a 57-item questionnaire assessing suicide risk factors, referred to as the Common Data Elements (CDEs), in order to facilitate data sharing and improve collaboration across independent studies. All studies funded by MSRC are required to include the CDEs in their assessment protocol. The CDEs include shortened measures of the following: current and past suicide risk, lethality and intent of past suicide attempts, hopelessness, thwarted belongingness, anxiety sensitivity, posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, traumatic brain injury, insomnia, and alcohol abuse. This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the CDE items drawn from empirically validated measures. Exploratory factor analysis was used to examine the overall structure of the CDE items, and confirmatory factor analyses were used to evaluate the distinct properties of each scale. Internal consistencies of the CDE scales and correlations with full measures were also examined. Merged data from 3,140 participants (81.0% military service members, 75.6% male) across 19 MSRC-funded studies were used in analyses. Results indicated that all measures exhibited adequate internal consistency, and all CDE shortened measures were significantly correlated with the corresponding full measures with moderate to strong effect sizes. Factor analyses indicated that the shortened CDE measures performed well in comparison with the full measures. Overall, our findings suggest that the CDEs are not only brief but also provide psychometrically valid scores when assessing suicide risk and related factors that may be used in future research.

Copyright Date

2017

Copyright Statement / License for Reuse

All Rights Reserved
All Rights Reserved.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the American Psychological Association. User is responsible for all copyright compliance. This article was originally published as:

Ringer, F. B., Soberay, K. A., Rogers, M. L., Hagan, C. R., Chu, C., Schneider, M., ..., & Joiner, T. E. (2018). Initial validation of brief measures of suicide risk factors: Common data elements used by the Military Suicide Research Consortium. Psychological Assessment, 30(6), 767–778. https://doi.org/10.1037/pas0000519

Accepted Manuscript is openly available through the "Link to Full Text" button.

The published Version of Record is available at libraries through Compass or Worldcat.

Rights Holder

American Psychological Association

Language

English (eng)

Publication Title

Psychological Assessment

Volume

30

Issue

6

First Page

767

Last Page

778

ISSN

1939-134X

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