title: The life attitudes schedule: a scale to assess adolescent life-enhancing and life-threatening behaviors.
abstract: The purpose of this study was to develop a questionnaire to measure suicidal and other risk-taking behaviors, the Life Attitudes Schedule (LAS), and to test a theoretical model that postulates a single domain of behaviors to which all life-threatening and life-enhancing behaviors belong. The LAS was developed and piloted on 1539 high school students and young adults. The schedule measures four different content categories: death related, health related, injury related, and self-related. Each content category includes an equal number of items designed to assess actions, thoughts, and feelings. Consistent with the theoretical model, the LAS includes positive (life-enhancing) and negative (life-threatening) behaviors. In this paper we present psychometric information for the LAS. The results are interpreted as providing support for a broad, bipolar conceptualization of suicidal and other risk-taking behavior that encompasses life-threatening and life-enhancing behaviors.
authors.affiliation: Oregon Research Institute, Eugene 97403-1983, USA.
authors.forename: P M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Lewinsohn
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Langhinrichsen-Rohling
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Langford
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Rohde
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Seeley
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chapman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001293:Attitude to Death; D003617:Dangerous Behavior; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010553:Personality Development; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010865:Pilot Projects; D011594:Psychometrics; D012016:Reference Values; D012309:Risk-Taking; D013405:Suicide / Q000523:psychology; D000092864:Suicide Prevention