In plain language
Most distressed young people never seek professional psychological help, and the problem may be worst among those who need it most. "Help-negation" is the troubling pattern in which people who are suicidal actively withdraw from offers of help or become less willing to seek it. This study asked whether help-negation is real among young adults, whom they would turn to for different kinds of problems, and whether the effect could be explained simply by hopelessness or by a lack of prior experience with help.
A total of 302 undergraduate university students completed questionnaires measuring suicidal ideation, hopelessness, prior help-seeking experience, and their intentions to seek help from various sources (friends, parents, other relatives, mental health professionals, telephone help lines, and doctors) for social-emotional problems, anxiety-depression, and suicidal thoughts.
Students said friends were their most likely source of help for every kind of problem, and for suicidal thoughts they were relatively more willing to consider professionals and help lines. But the key finding was clear evidence of help-negation: the higher a student's actual suicidal ideation, the lower their intentions to seek help from anyone, and the higher their intention to seek no help at all. Crucially, this effect was not explained by hopelessness, prior help-seeking experience, or gender. The authors suggest that suicidal thinking itself may impair the orientation toward solving problems and reaching out, meaning services cannot simply wait for suicidal young people to come to them.
Key findings
- 16% of the 302 students reported suicidal ideation levels similar to suicide attempters with chronic psychiatric problems, and 18% reported moderate-to-severe depression.
- Friends were consistently rated the most likely source of help for all problem types, but students were less likely to turn to friends, parents, and relatives, and relatively more likely to consider mental health professionals and help lines, for suicidal thoughts.
- Higher suicidal ideation was associated with lower intentions to seek help for suicidal problems from every source of help, and with a greater intention to seek help from no one at all (r = .25).
- After controlling for hopelessness, prior help-seeking experience, and gender, suicidal ideation still significantly predicted reduced help-seeking intentions, with the strongest reduction for mental health professionals.
- The help-negation pattern held both when suicidal ideation was analysed continuously and when the highest-scoring 16% were compared with the rest of the sample.
- Help-negation appears to involve more than negative expectations about the future; the authors propose social problem-solving orientation as one potential explanatory factor.
How to cite
APA
Deane, F. P., Wilson, C. J., & Ciarrochi, J. (2001). Suicidal ideation and help-negation: Not just hopelessness or prior help. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 57(7), 901–914. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.1058
BibTeX
@article{deane2001suicidal,
author = {Deane, Frank P. and Wilson, Coralie J. and Ciarrochi, Joseph},
title = {Suicidal ideation and help-negation: Not just hopelessness or prior help},
journal = {Journal of Clinical Psychology},
year = {2001},
volume = {57},
number = {7},
pages = {901--914},
doi = {10.1002/jclp.1058}
}
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Author: Joseph Ciarrochi (ORCID 0000-0003-0471-8100). Free copy hosted with permission for scholarly use. Please cite the published version via the DOI above.