The past decade has seen a doubling in the number of children and teenagers in the United States hospitalized for attempting or considering suicide.
At ¶¶Òőapp, Cindy Huang, Assistant Professor of Counseling Psychology, and Christine Cha, Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology, are unraveling the complex causes of youth suicide and suicide ideation, designing assessÂments for individual risk among children and teens, and developing novel interventions and prevention techniques. To harness TCâs multidisciplinary strength, Huang and Cha, supported by TCâs Provostâs Investment Fund, have also launched the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Project (CAMHP).
Such a multipronged approach is surprisingly rare. âAsking what puts a person at risk is very different than asking âWhat can we do about that risk?ââ says Cha. âWith my focus on adolescent suicide and self-harm risk assessment and Cindyâs focus on youth mental health interventions, we realized we had a great opportunity to collaborate.â
âBy understanding dynamics in these different settings in culturally relevant ways, weâre getting a sense of the ecological context for at-risk youth.â
âCindy Huang
CAMHPâs initial research project focuses on testing and adapting the , a well-documented, evidence-based intervention used to evaluate individual familiesâ psychological and interpersonal dynamics and to provide parents and caregivers with tools to help improve the well-being of their child.
âThe Family Check-Up has never been used as a suicide or self-harm prevention intervention,â says Huang. âThatâs an important niche thatâs been missing.â
Huang and Cha hope that future CAMHP research projects will incorporate another critical yet underexplored factor in youth self-harm studies. âWe want to focus on the lack of awareness of suicide risk and behavior among minority youth,â says Huang.
Cindy Huang, Assistant Professor of Counseling Psychology
Cha points out that most suicide studies do not report on the race or ethnicity of their subjects. âIf we donât even report on race and ethnicity in these studies, then how can we say something substantial about whoâs at risk?â she says.
CAMHP has already established a strong partnership with Hamilton-Madison House, a large mental health and social services organizaÂtion in New York Cityâs Chinatown.
âWe know that so much social-emotional learning happens at home and at school,â said Huang. âBy expanding our understanding of dynamics in these different settings in culturally relevant ways, weâre getting a better sense of the ecological context of whatâs happening to at-risk youth. That will inform what we do with interÂventions moving forward.â