Feasibility and Acceptability of Ecological Momentary Assessment for Suicidal Ideation among Youth in Zambia, Lusaka
Résumé fourni par la source
Suicidality represents a major global public health concern and is particularly under-researched in low- and middle-income countries, including many regions in the Global South. Youth who have recently attempted suicide are at elevated risk for recurrent suicidal thoughts and behaviors, yet little is known about the short-term fluctuations in suicidal ideation, affect, and contextual factors in these settings. Understanding these dynamic processes is essential for improving post-attempt monitoring and prevention strategies. Suicidal ideation is known to fluctuate substantially across days and weeks, especially following a suicide attempt. These rapid changes are difficult to capture using traditional retrospective self-report measures, which are subject to recall bias and may miss momentary peaks in risk. Ecological momentary assessment (EMA) offers a method that is sensitive to such temporal variability by collecting repeated, real-time data on thoughts, emotions, and contextual experiences in participants’ natural environments. The widespread availability of smartphones further supports the potential scalability of EMA approaches. However, EMA has rarely been implemented in low-resource and high-stigma contexts to study suicidality and related mental health processes. Technical, practical, and cultural barriers may influence participants’ ability and willingness to engage with frequent smartphone-based assessments. As such, before testing etiological or predictive models, it is necessary to establish whether EMA is feasible and acceptable in these settings. Therefore, this EMA sub-study of the SBIL project aims to examine the feasibility and acceptability of smartphone-based ecological momentary assessment among youth treated for suicide attempts in Lusaka, Zambia. By collecting repeated real-time data on suicidal ideation and related experiences, the study seeks to evaluate whether EMA can serve as a viable monitoring approach in a low-resource, high-stigma context and to characterize patterns and fluctuations in momentary suicidal ideation following a suicide attempt.
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