Reliability and validity of the Columbia suicide screen in junior middle school students / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To examine the reliability and validity of the Columbia suicide screen (CSS) in detecting suicide risk for junior middle school students.Methods Using convenient sampling,902 students of a junior middle school were tested with CSS and Beck depression inventory (BDI).Cronbach's alpha coefficient,parity split-half coefficient and test-retest reliability were examined after two weeks.Content validity was evaluated using specialist analysis and sensibility analysis.The BDI was used to explore the correlative validity.The convergent validity of CSS and another suicide risk screening method was examined.Results The proportion of students with suicide problem (suicide ideation or suicide attempts),suicide ideation within the previous year and suicide attempts in the past were 14.97％ (135/902),14.19％ (128/902)and 3.66％ (33/902) respectively.The Cronbach's alpha coefficient and Parity split-half coefficient of CSS were 0.844 and 0.908,respectively.The test-retest reliability of CSS were screening of suicide ideation (ICC =0.897),screening of suicide attempts (ICC =0.798),screening of substance use (ICC =0.882),screening of suicide problem (ICC =0.881),and screening of suicide problem combine depression (ICC =0.829)(P＜0.01).Sensibility analysis of CSS showed the cronbach α ranged from 0.834 to 0.845.Correlative validity between CSS and BDI were screening of suicide ideation (ρ =0.238,0.337,0.334,0.599),screening of suicide attempts (ρ =0.122,0.231,0.310,0.221),screening of depression (ρ =0.335,0.309,0.196,0.215),screening of suicide problem(ρ =0.240,0.328,0.321,0.590)and screening of suicide problem combine depression(ρ=0.212,0.324,0.320,0.474) (P＜0.01).Convergent validity between CSS and another suicide risk screening method were screening of suicide ideation (ρ =0.468),screening of suicide attempts (ρ =0.349),screening of suicide problem (ρ =0.453),and screening of suicide problem combine depression(ρ=0.469)(P＜0.01).Conclusion CSS has good internal consistency reliability,split-half reliability and content validity.Screening of suicide ideation,suicide attempts,suicide problem and suicide problem combine depression have good test-retest reliability,but the correlative validity and convergent validity are not satisfying.These four screening methods can only be used for preliminary screening suicide risk in junior middle school students.