Abstract

This study aimed to develop a suicide risk assessment for detainees’ intervention and suicidal prevention at early stage. The study consisted of two studies. First study explored potential items of suicide risk assessment and second study empirically investigated psychometric characteristics such as interrater reliability, concurrent validity, and AUC for confirming cut-off score to high risk offenders. As a result, 20 items were first adopted and then 14 items were finally fixed through a Beta-test. The interrater reliability showed ‘good’ level consistency among raters. It also revealed significant positive correlations with the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale(CES-D), Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire(SIQ), and a high negative correlation with the Reasons For Living scale(RFL). The ROC analysis marked the highest distinction level at 4-point or higher for the moderate risk group, and 10-point or higher for the high risk group. This study is significant because of first suicide risk assessment for detainees. Finally, we further discussed values and implications in the socio-psychological context as well as research limitations.