Relationship of personality, environmental, and DICA variables to adolescent hopelessness: a neural network sensitivity approach.

OBJECTIVE: This study identified critical factors from a set of psychiatric diagnoses, personality traits, and family and social support variables that relate to hopelessness in adolescents. METHOD: One hundred fifty adolescents were selected in a systematic sample from 1,700 high school students; they completed the Millon Adolescent Personality Inventory, the Parental Bonding Questionnaire, the Social Support Questionnaire, the Hopelessness Scale for Children and were interviewed by trained clinicians on the Diagnostic Interview for Children and Adolescents. Selected variables were chosen for a back-propagation neural network model and for subsequent sensitivity and statistical analysis. RESULTS: Sensitive adolescents and adolescents with less impulse control scored high on hopelessness. Forceful adolescents were less hopeless. CONCLUSIONS: Using the neural network models, the authors suggest that assertive training as well as group activities that increase cooperativeness may ameliorate hopelessness.