Parent's suicide attempt makes child's much more likely: New Study

A new study has revealed suicide attempts by a parent increases the odds nearly fivefold that a child would attempt suicide.

The researchers found a direct effect of a parent's suicide attempt on a suicide attempt by their child. Even after researchers took into account a history of previous suicide attempts by the offspring and a familial transmission of mood disorder.

David A Brent, MD, of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre, Pennsylvania, said that impulsive aggression was an important precursor of mood disorder and could be targeted in interventions designed to prevent youth at high familial risk from making a suicide attempt.