and Assessing Students At Risk for Suicide. Signature redacted for privacy. Abstract approved:

Suicide is the primary cause of death of adolescents in freland. While much attention has been given this phenomenon, no research has specifically examined the role of guidance counsellors in secondary schools in Ireland in addressing this phenomenon. The purpose of this research was to examine the self-efficacy of guidance counsellors in Ireland for identifying and assessing students at risk for suicide, including four hypothesized predictors for such self-efficacy. These predictors were gender, institution of training, membership of the Irish Institute of Guidance and Counselling, and exposure to a suicidal student. The participants were 405 members of the Irish Institute of Guidance Counselling, a professional organization whose membership was inclusive of all guidance counsellors in secondary schools in Ireland. The instrument utilized was entitled Adolescent Suicide, and included fourteen questions measuring the three components of self-efficacy (i.e., efficacy expectations, outcome expectations and outcome values). The results were analyzed using measures of central tendency and logistic regression. Analyses using measures of central tendency indicated that Irish guidance counsellors as a whole had high global self