A national survey of doctoral psychology education and training in suicide risk and violence risk assessment and management

Abstract

IntroductionWhen, in the judgment of a mental health professional, patient suicide risk and/or patient violence risk are considered imminent, they have been referred to as behavioral emergencies. Past surveys have suggested that education and training with these emergency situations have been inadequate. The present study was undertaken to obtain more current information on the training that psychologists receive in these areas of practice.MethodAll directors of APA‐accredited graduate psychology programs and all directors of APA‐accredited predoctoral psychology internship programs were asked to complete an online survey inquiring about such training provided in their programs.ResultsResults indicated that both sets of directors rated such doctoral training in suicide risk assessment and management as very important. Internship directors, however, were significantly more likely than graduate program directors to state that psychologists should be required to complete continuing education courses on other‐directed violence risk. Serious gaps in training were identified; that is, only 59.2% of psychology graduate directors reported that their program offered training in safety planning for suicide risk and only 25.4% reported that their program offered training in safety planning for violence risk.ConclusionGiven that serious injury and even death can occur from patient suicidal behavior and/or a patient violent behavior, the implications of these findings are discussed.

Avoiding failures when applying principle-based ethics to difficult ethical situations in psychotherapy.

“…Many state psychology boards now require training in suicide as a condition of license renewal, suggesting that they consider it a core competency for all licensed psychologists. Whereas 30 years ago, less than half of doctoral programs included suicide prevention in their curriculum (Bongar & Harmatz, 1991), more than 90% of doctoral psychology programs now do so (Kleespies et al, 2023).…”

Ethical and practical considerations for mandating suicide prevention training for mental health professionals.

“…Survey results indicate only 7% of New York MHPs received graduate education on suicide prevention (Labouliere et al, 2021). American Psychological Association-accredited doctoral programs still highlight current gaps in training: Only 59.2% of programs provided safety planning training, and only 46.5% of programs provided mean restrictions training (Kleespies et al, 2023). Consequently, while graduate training could be a key avenue in delivering suicide prevention training, many trainees graduate without the evidence-based training.…”

“…The majority of graduate program and internship directors of American Psychological Association-accredited programs may favor the requirement of CE in suicide risk assessment and management for psychologists. Notably, 77% of graduate program directors and 80.5% of internship directors endorsed a mandated suicide prevention training through CE for licensure (Kleespies et al, 2023). Thus, there may be administrative and institutional support, which may help to implement the policy.…”