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Symposia

Couples / Close Relationships

Learning from Risk Studies in Military and Veteran Couples: Embracing Complexity Across Levels of Care

4 - (SYM 73) Accuracy and Predictors of Partner Knowledge of Suicidal Individuals' Suicide History and Future Risk: An Investigation in a Hospitalized Military Sample

Saturday, November 16, 2024
10:30 AM – 11:30 AM EST
Location: Grand Ballroom K/L, Level 5, Downtown Marriott
Abstract Body


Background:  Suicidal individuals do not exist in a vacuum. They are part of relationships, friendships, and communities. Many theories of suicide explicitly incorporate relational and interpersonal factors (Durkheim, 1897; Joiner, 2007; Klonsky & May, 2015). The connection is complex; ruptures in relationships can serve to increase risk, while support can reduce risk. Romantic partners are often the first or only members of a suicidal individual’s network to know about the suicidal crisis. However, research on suicide prevention and intervention has overwhelmingly focused on the suicidal individual and excluded the relationship partner. Little is known about how accurately information about suicide is transmitted between partners. This study investigated three questions related to partner knowledge of SITB history and future risk of their hospitalized partner (i.e., the patient): 1) how accurate were they; 2) was accuracy related to communication or relationship functioning; and 3) by what means did partners learn about patient suicide history.


Methods:  Ninety-one psychiatrically hospitalized U.S. service members and their romantic partners provided data as part of a larger RCT. All participants (n=182) answered baseline questions about their own histories of suicide ideation, attempt, and concerns about future risk. This was followed by questions about their knowledge about their partners’ histories of the same. Participants also reported on their relationship functioning, communication patterns and mode of disclosure.


Results:  Overall, partners had low agreement relative to chance with patients regarding history of behaviors (κ’s .20-.44) and risk of future behaviors (weighted κ’s .08-.16). However, absolute agreement ranged from 56.1% to 85.7% for past thoughts and behaviors and 26.4% to 35.2% for future risk. Partners were most accurate about history of suicide ideation and least accurate about aborted/interrupted suicide attempt history. Neither relationship functioning nor communication patterns were significant predictors of accuracy between couples (p’s > .05). Of the partners endorsing the patients’ past behavior, the most frequent reason for knowing about behaviors was direct conversations regarding NSSI (67.9%), suicidal ideation (79.8%), and suicide attempts (57.7%).


Discussion:  Results suggest that couples across the spectrum of relationship functioning may benefit from interventions designed to support them in discussing SITBs. Implication for clinical practice will be discussed.