Predicting of Suicide Ideation in Individuals with Obsessive-Compulsive Tendencies: The Roles of Alexithymia, Responsibility Attitude, Positive/Negative Affect

Abstract

Background and Objectives: The aim of the present study was to investigate the relationship among alexithymia, responsibility attitude, positive and negative affect, and suicidal ideation in people with obsessive tendencies. Material and Methods: The study sample was comprised of 400 students from Tabriz University from whom 151 students with an obsession score higher than the cut-off point were selected randomly as people with obsession tendency. Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20), responsibility attitude scale (RAS), PANAS Positive and Negative Affect Schedule, Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale and Beck Scale for Suicidal Ideation (BSSI) were used to collect the data. The data were analyzed using Pearson product-moment correlation method and hierarchical regression. Results: The hierarchical regression results showed that controlling demographic variables, alexithymia variable as overall, difficulty identifying feelings subscale, difficulty describing feelings subscale and negative affect can predict suicide. Responsibility and positive affect variables and externally-oriented thinking in alexithymia could not predict the dependent variable. Conclusion: Based on these findings, we can conclude that difficulty identifying feelings, difficulty describing feelings and negative affect are the main determinants for suicide in people with obsessive tendencies.

Keywords

• obsessive-compulsive disorder
• suicidal ideation
• alexithymia
• responsibility
• positive and negative affect