Childhood maltreatment and impulsivity as predictors of interpersonal violence, self-injury and suicide attempts: A national study

Abstract

Prior research indicates that childhood maltreatment and impulsivity increase the risk for different types of violence, including violent behaviors directed toward the self and others. However, it is not known whether childhood maltreatment and impulsivity have independent effects on different violent behaviors. Therefore, this study examined the differential effects of childhood maltreatment and impulsivity on interpersonal violence, suicide attempts, and self-injury. Data were drawn from a nationally representative survey of 34,653 US adults, the 2004-2005 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC). Structural equation modeling was used to simultaneously examine the shared and specific effects of five types of childhood maltreatment and impulsivity on the risk of different violent behaviors (i.e. interpersonal violence, suicide attempts, and self-injury). Analyses were stratified by gender and adjusted for age and ethnicity. Impulsivity and childhood maltreatment independently increased the risk of suicide attempt, self-injury, and interpersonal violence. Childhood maltreatment had stronger effects on violence directed towards the self than on interpersonal violence in both genders, while impulsivity had a stronger effect on self-injury than on suicide attempt or interpersonal violence in men. These findings indicate that childhood maltreatment and impulsivity relate differently to the risk of different types of violence.

The Role of Childhood Abuse Experience and Early Maladaptive Schemas in Predicting Impulsivity Among Patients with Psychiatric Disorders

“…The severity of impulsiveness, however, played a more important role in self-injury than interpersonal violence or suicide attempts. Their study thus concluded that the childhood maltreatment experience and impulsivity were probably involved in different types of harmful and aggressive behaviors towards oneself and others (41). In the present study, females impulsivity score was higher than males, suggesting that impulsivity was higher in males than females.…”

What Differentiates Prisoners Who Attempt Suicide from Those Who Experience Suicidal Ideation? A Nationally Representative Study

“…To the extent that this was the case, prevalence rates are likely to be lower bound estimates. Third, a single-item assessment for both suicidal ideation and attempt was adopted, which may bias results towards an inflation of prevalence estimates due to misclassification (Millner, Lee, & Nock, 2015). In doing so, we were unable to capture the frequency or severity of suicidal outcomes -both the attempt and ideation groups therefore reflect a heterogeneous 984 FROM IDEATION TO ACTION composition of suicidal individuals.…”

Prediction of attempted suicide in men and women with crack-cocaine use disorder in Brazil

“…We also found that aggression was significantly associated with attempted suicide in women. This factor could have an overlap with suicidal behavior, interpersonal aggression, and self-harm as a spectral event, in which some subjects may engage in one of these different types of violent behavior [84,85]. Interestingly, it is suggested that aggression and impulsivity are diathesis factors in suicidal behavior [86,87].…”