Abstract

This study was designed to test the effects of narrative psychotherapy(Self-Confrontation Method) on the reduction of middle school students' suicidal ideation. Beck's Scale for Suicidal Ideation(SSI) was administered to all participants. Among the participants with high suicidal ideation, five students were randomly assigned in the narrative-therapy group and six were in the control group. After all therapy sessions, SSI was re-administered for the narrative-therapy group as well as the waiting list control group. The results showed that the narrative-therapy was effective in reducing middle school students' suicidal ideation. For the waiting list control group, the effective change of the suicidal ideation was not found. The qualitative analyses of Valuation-Affect Matrix and Validation/Invalidation were also performed. The middle school students with high suicidal ideation had mostly -O valuations and -S valuations in the first investigation but significantly changed to +O valuations, +S valuations and +HH valuations in the second investigation. Finally, the limitations and the suggestions of this study were discussed.