events can tip the balance between life and death. The differences that arerelated to age and development levels are factors to examine (14).Impulsivity is the biological risk factor for children. They are more impulsive and violent intheir suicidal behavior and this is why they are more likely to commit a spontaneous act (Borst12). There are two major psychological factors that increase children’s risk of suicide. The firstone is a sense of inferiority. Children need to develop feelings of confidence and positive self-regard. Those children who fail to develop these feelings may experience strong feelings ofinferiority and develop poor self-concepts and low self-esteem (14).“The second psychological risk factor specific to childhood is the expandable childsyndrome, which involves very low self-esteem in addition to other significant problems” (15).Parents communicate very low regard for the children, hostility toward them, and even hatred ofthem on a daily bases. This makes the child believe that they are unworthy and expendable andtheir death will not matter to anyone. The expendable child syndrome may activate a wish to die.Children often use suicide to stop being a burden on the parent (15). Evidence also shows that most suicidal children are often victims of child abuse or neglect(Coleman 15). Those children who do not suffer from abuse and neglect, their familyenvironments are less healthy than those of other children (Borst 15). Families with suicidalchildren tend to be inflexible and resistant to change (Coleman 15).Children may demonstrate depression differently from adults (Borst 16). “Depressedchildren may manifest increased anxiety, sleep disturbance, aggressive behavior, low frustrationtolerance, and poor impulse control” (16). Triggering events for child suicide are seemingly minorlife events (16).The suicide rate for fifteen to twenty-four year-old exceeds the overall suicide rate for thetot...
