Background: Childhood maltreatment is consistently associated with adolescent depression and suicidal ideation. Ideation-to-action frameworks (Integrated Motivational-Volitional model; Three-Step Theory) propose that suicidal ideation is closely related to proximal states such as depression, whereas other volitional factors may be relevant to movement from ideation to behavior. We examined whether depression status statistically accounted for the association between maltreatment severity and suicide ideation in youth, while also estimating any remaining direct association. Methods: We analyzed 67 youths aged 11-18 years (M=15.7, SD=1.57). Cases were treatment-seeking outpatients with major depressive disorder (n=35), diagnosed by a child and adolescent psychiatrist using K-SADS-PL-DSM-5 interviews with youths and caregivers; controls (n=32) were community youths without K-SADS diagnoses. Participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form (CTQ-SF) and the Suicide Probability Scale (SPS) (suicide-ideation subscale), with depressive symptoms corroborated using the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale-Major Depressive Disorder (RCADS-MDD) subscale. A path model estimated associations for maltreatment→depression status (a), depression status→ideation (b), and maltreatment→ideation directly (c′). Results: Depressed youths reported higher maltreatment and ideation than controls. Greater maltreatment severity was associated with depressed-group membership (a: β=0.167, p=0.003); depressed status was associated with higher ideation (b: β=1.102, p
Songül et al. (Thu,) studied this question.