Adaptation of Diagnostic Instruments for Suicidal Aspects of Personality

Abstract

The results of a Russian adaptation of the questionnaires The Psychache Scale (Holden et al., 2001), Reasons for Living Inventory (Linehan et al., 1983) and Reasons for Attempting Suicide Questionnaire (Johns, Holden, 1997) are presented. The translation was done and then mentally healthy people aged 16-26 were questioned (150 under- and postgraduate students and high-school youth in Moscow, 66 males, 84 females; and 221 undergraduate students in Cheboksary, 50 males, 171 females). Psychometric properties of the Russian versions of the adapted questionnaires showed good results in reproducibility of the factors’ structures that constitute the questionnaires’ scales, their reliability and construct validity. With the principal components method, varimax rotation, the satisfactory correspondence of the structure of the Russian versions of the questionnaires to the structure of the original versions is confirmed. After the follow-up revision the Russian versions of the questionnaires may be used for the assessment of the suicide risk and motivation of suicidal behavior in high-school youth and university students, as well as in research purposes to study the reasons for suicidal behavior.