Abstract
Objectives: The current study was aimed to identify the factors and mechanisms that promote nonsuicidal self-injury and suicidal ideation (SI) as precursors of suicidal behaviors in a sample of 553 Israeli active-duty soldiers. Methods: A mediation model was used to examine the contribution of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, emotion-regulation difficulties, habituation, and risk-taking behaviors to soldiers' self-injury and SI. Results: Results indicated direct effects between PTSD symptoms and self-injury and SI, as well as between emotion regulation difficulties and self-injury. Indirect effects were found between PTSD symptoms and nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) through the mechanisms of habituation and risk-taking behavior and between difficulties in emotion regulation and NSSI through the mechanism of risk-taking behaviors. Conclusion: To tackle soldiers' suicidal behaviors, clinicians might assess soldiers' PTSD symptoms and difficulties in emotion regulation and intervene by lessening their access to thrill-seeking situations and situations that increase habituation to pain and death.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 590-601 |
| Number of pages | 12 |
| Journal | Journal of Clinical Psychology |
| Volume | 78 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Apr 2022 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2021 Wiley Periodicals LLC
Keywords
- emotion regulation
- habituation
- military service
- nonsuicidal self-Injury
- posttraumatic symptoms
- risk-taking
- suicidal ideation
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Clinical Psychology
- Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous)