Relations Between Hopelessness, Depressive Symptoms and Suicidality: Mediation by Reasons for Living Courtney L. Bagge, 1 Dorian A. Lamis, 2 Michael Nadorff, 3 and Augustine Osman 4 1 University of Mississippi Medical Center 2 Emory University School of Medicine/Grady Health System 3 Mississippi State University 4 University of Texas at San Antonio Objective: The present study examined whether reasons for living (RFL) would partially account for the associations between traditional risk factors (depressive symptoms, hopelessness) and sui- cidal ideation and attempts. Method: Data were collected from 1,075 undergraduate college students who completed a battery of online assessments. Results: Results from a series of si- multaneous mediational models indicated that the relations between risk factors and current suicidal ideation were partially mediated by total RFL (and Coping Beliefs and Self-Evaluation subscales). Fur- ther, total RFL (and the Coping Beliefs subscale) fully mediated the relation between hopelessness and past-year suicide attempt, and partially mediated the depressive symptoms-suicide attempt relation. Conclusions: This study demonstrates the importance of assessing for the presence of these suicide risk and protective factors. Implications for the improved identification and treatment of young adults at risk for suicide are discussed. C  2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Clin. Psychol. 00:1–14, 2013. Keywords: suicidal ideation; suicide attempt; reasons for living; hopelessness; college students Suicide is a major public health concern in the United States and is the third leading cause of death among young adults (aged 18–24 years; Xu, Kochanek, Murphy, & Tejada-Vera, 2010), accounting for approximately 3,500 suicides each year (Center of Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2010). Rates of suicidal ideation and attempts are also of interest within this age group, particularly among those attending college. Specifically, approximately 20% of college students report seriously considering suicide, whereas over 7% report attempting suicide in their lifetime (American College Health Association, 2011). Moreover, in a recent study of over 15,000 undergraduates at 70 colleges and universities, 6% reported having seriously considered committing suicide in the past 12 months (Drum, Brownson, Burton Denmark, & Smith, 2009) and 1.7% reported making a suicide attempt in the past year (Barrios, Everett, Simon, & Brener, 2000). Given the importance of preventing suicidal ideation and behavior (i.e., suicide attempts and completions), a large body of research has focused on identifying reliable risk markers, or predictors, of suicidality in this age group. Both depression and hopelessness about the future, in particular, have been identified as robust psychological risk factors for suicidal ideation and behavior (see Haney et al., 2012 for review; National Institute of Mental Health [NIMH 2011]), and these factors are frequently targeted in prevention and treatment programs of suicidality (e.g., Drum & Burton Denmark, 2011; Jobes, 2006; Wenzel, Brown, & Beck, 2008). However, from a prevention and treatment perspective, it is imperative to supplement the identification of risk factors with the examination of potential mechanisms underlying associations between known risk factors (e.g., depression and hopelessness) and suicidal ideation and behavior. A number of theoretical models of suicidal behavior (Joiner, 2005; Schotte, Cools, & Payvar, 1990; Williams, Barnhofer, Crane, & Beck, 2005) have posited that cognitive processes are important mediating variables in understanding suicidal risk. One cognitive factor, the im- portance assigned to reasons for living (RFL; Linehan, Goodstein, Nielson, & Chiles, 1983) Please address correspondence to: Courtney L. Bagge, University of Mississippi Medical Center, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Jackson, MS, 39216. E-mail: cbagge@umc.edu JOURNAL OF CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY, Vol. 00(0), 1–14 (2013) C  2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/jclp). DOI: 10.1002/jclp.22005