ABSTRACT
Introduction: Suicide is one of the leading causes of death among adolescents. Although it is known that both perfectionism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder ('ADHD') are important risk factors for suicide, there are no studies that have investigated the relationship between suicidal behavior and perfectionism among people with ADHD. Aim: The current study investigates the association between perfectionism and suicide in adolescents with ADHD. Method: Subjects included 88 adolescents with ADHD and 96 non-clinical control adolescents. We used the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale to evaluate perfectionism as well as its separate traits, and the Mini International Neuropsychologic Interview Kid to evaluate psychiatric disorders and suicidal behavior. Differences between the groups were statistically evaluated using t-tests, a Poisson regression analysis with suicide as a discrete variable, and a logistic regression analysis with suicide as a binary variable. Results: Compared to the control group, the ADHD group showed a significantly lower level on the adaptive 'Organization' trait of perfectionism, but not on any other trait, and a significantly higher level of suicidal behavior. Logistic regression results indicated a significant association for perfectionism in general (OR = 0.93, p = 0.003), and for the 'Personal Standards' trait (OR: 0.82, p = 0.039). Poisson regression analysis also showed a significant association with perfectionism in general (IRR = 0.90; p < 0.001) and with the 'Personal standards' trait model (IRR = 0.81, p = 0.019). Discussion: Our results indicate that a low level of perfectionism, in particular 'Personal standards', may be a risk factor for suicidal behavior in adolescents with ADHD. We recommend that psychoeducation and therapy of adolescents with ADHD should consider focusing on adaptive perfection as a possible risk factor for suicide as well.
ABSTRACT
Abstract The aim of the present research was to reveal what kind of values, self-conceptualisation and beliefs of personhood characterize two generations of Hungarians, almost three decades after the socio-political changes from socialism to capitalist market economy. Participants were high school students (N = 239) and adults (N = 122). Value-orientation was measured using the Portrait Value Questionnaire (PVQ, Schwartz et al., 2001), beliefs of personhood were measured by the Lay Contextualism Scale (Owe et al., 2013). Self-construals were measured in case of the high school students by using 23 items from Gudykunst et al. (1996) self-construal scale and in case of the adults a modified version of it (Owe et al., 2013). Results indicate that in the post-socialist Hungary, individualistic values and independent self-concept strongly characterize both the high school students and the adults, but the younger generation displays higher tendency towards individualism.
Resumen El objetivo del presente trabajo fue encontrar qué tipo de valores, auto-conceptuación y creencias de la persona caracterizan dos generaciones de húngaros, casi tres décadas después de los cambios sociopolíticos del socialismo al mercado económico capitalista. Los participantes fueron estudiantes universitarios (N=239) y adultos (N=122). La orientación hacia los valores fue evaluada utilizando el Cuestionario de Valores (PVQ, Portrait Value Questionnaire; Schwartz et al., 2001), las creencias sobre la persona fueron evaluados a través de la Escala de Contextualismo (Owe et al., 2013), las auto-definiciones fueron evaluadas utilizando los 23 reactivos de la escala de autodefinición de Gudykunst et al. (1996) para el caso de los estudiantes, y para los adultos se utilizó la versión modificada del instrumento de autodefinición (Owe et al., 2013). Los resultados indican que, en la Hungría post-socialista, los valores individualistas y un autoconcepto independiente caracterizan fuertemente a ambos grupos, aunque la generación más joven muestra mayor tendencia hacia el individualismo.
