vice people such as psychologists, psychiatrists, and physicians to identify teens who are at risk of suicide. In this regard, one clear indicator of risk, the authors state, is depression; however, they point out that teens rarely say they are depressed. Rather, they tend to speak of feeling "turned off" or sad. Sometimes, they manifest somatic correlates of depression such as insomnia, fatigue, loss of appetite and libido.
Finch and Poznanski (1971) state that the easiest suicidal patient to recognize is the psychotic patient who speaks of voices commanding him to kill himself. The most difficult is the paranoid psychotic who tends to be quiet and withdrawn and refuses to divulge his fantasy life. Of psychotic patients in general, the authors state that all should be regarded as potential suicides until the facts prove otherwise.
Another way of identifying adolescents who are at risk of suicide consists of psychological testing. Knopf (1984) points out that the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inve
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