Suicidality and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) among youth in the United States continue to be a growing and serious public health concern. With alarming rates of suicide trending in the wrong direction, researchers are committed to reducing rates by 2025. Understanding the antecedents and conditions, existing measures, and disparate prevalence rates across minoritized groups is imperative for developing effective strategies for meeting this goal.
In a 2006 study by Pilowsky and Wu, they found that youth aged 12 to 17 with a history of foster care placement were four times more likely than those without a history of foster care placement to have reported suicide attempts in the last 12 months. A more recent study examining suicide and child protective system (CPS) involvement in California from 1999 to 2017 revealed that children and youth who were placed in foster care had almost 5 times the odds of suicide compared to children without any CPS involvement and those with any CPS involvement had 3.6 times high odds of suicide than those without CPS involvement. Explanations for this increased risk can be attributed to many of the antecedents to suicidality, including reduced social support, traumatic experiences, maltreatment, and mental health challenges that are exacerbated among system-involved youth.
