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An Assessment of the Utility of Suicide Prediction *
Author(s) -
MacKin Douglas R.,
Farberow Norman L.
Publication year - 1976
Publication title -
suicide and life‐threatening behavior
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.544
H-Index - 90
eISSN - 1943-278X
pISSN - 0363-0234
DOI - 10.1111/j.1943-278x.1976.tb00673.x
Subject(s) - schedule , false positive paradox , suicide rates , event (particle physics) , population , computer science , statistics , econometrics , psychology , poison control , suicide prevention , machine learning , medicine , medical emergency , mathematics , environmental health , physics , quantum mechanics , operating system
Efforts to predict a future event assume varying levels of confidence depending on its base rate and the error rate of the prediction instrument. Most researchers working with suicide prediction instruments seem tacitly to assume they will be able to predict a future suicide most of the time. Applying basic decision theory on a neuropsychiatric hospital population indicates that researchers using a prediction schedule will be unlikely to predict a future suicide beyond a 20% level of efficiency. Contrary to the general clinical view, eliminating false negatives was shown to be more practical than eliminating false positives in increasing the efficiency of a predictive schedule.