Automatic and controlled antecedents of suicidal ideation and action: A dual-process conceptualization of suicidality.

Abstract

Dual-process models of cognition distinguish relatively automatic from relatively controlled processes in terms of their interactive impact on perception, judgment, and behavior. Such models have advanced explanation and prediction in a variety of domains across psychology but have yet to be comprehensively applied to the pressing societal and public health problem of suicide. We propose a model of suicide that integrates dual-process models of social cognition with ideation-to-action conceptualizations of suicide. The model specifies: (a) suicide-relevant automatic associations involving the self, others, the future, death, and bodily harm, (b) suicide-relevant motives involving the self, interpersonal relations, the future, and the desire to die, and (c) hypotheses regarding the conditions under which automatic associations and motives individually and interactively impact suicidal ideation and lethal action at various stages of an ideation-toaction framework. The model recasts a number of suicide-relevant variables in terms of the opportunity factor of dual-process theories of attitudes, which encompasses capacity-relevant variables (e.g., time, cognitive resources) that determine whether suicide-relevant judgments and behavior are the result of relatively automatic associations or more controlled, deliberative cognition. Accordingly, the model articulates a number of novel predictions regarding the sources of suicide-relevant automatic associations, motives, and opportunity factors, as well as their interactive influences on suicidal ideation and action.

Fluctuations in and associations between physical and psychological distance to suicide methods, fearlessness about death, and suicidal intent.

“…As such, continued focus on assessing and reducing physical access to individuals’ potential suicide methods is warranted, though this should particularly be done in conjunction with other empirically supported interventions to manage suicidal crises (Barber & Miller, 2014; Betz et al, 2016; Bryan et al, 2017; Stanley & Brown, 2012). More broadly, interventions that increase one’s opportunity (i.e., time, cognitive capacity) to consider and enact behavioral alternatives in the context of low psychological distance to suicide methods may have particular utility (Olson et al, 2022).…”

“…(Barber & Miller, 2014;Betz et al, 2016;Bryan et al, 2017;Stanley & Brown, 2012). More broadly, interventions that increase one's opportunity (i.e., time, cognitive capacity) to consider and enact behavioral alternatives in the context of low psychological distance to suicide methods may have particular utility (Olson et al, 2022).…”

Longitudinal mediation by perceived burden of the pathway from thwarted belonging to suicidal ideation

“…Traditional dual‐process models distinguish the influence of automatic, non‐conscious processes from controlled, deliberative processes in attention (Posner & Snyder, 1975), memory (e.g., Linscott & Knight, 2001), and other domains of functioning. Olson et al (2021) have suggested that perceived belonging and burden, as well as other components within the interpersonal model, have automatic and controlled counterparts. Critically, these operate over distinct time‐frames and contribute independently to the emergence of suicidal thinking and behavior.…”

Two Kinds of Process or Two Kinds of Processing? Disambiguating Dual-Process Theories

“…The first (B1), which predates this discussion and continued without being necessarily affected by it, was the branch of studies that use the duality as a framework to investigate specific behaviours. Recent examples include tolerance of minority groups (Verkuyten et al 2022), vaccine hesitancy (Bilewicz and Soral 2022) and suicidal ideation and action (Olson et al 2022), amongst many others. The second branch (B2) is the one in which Evans and Stanovich intervened more directly, which discusses dual-process theories per se.…”