Adolescent suicide, which has been ranked among the top 10 causes of death in the world, is an issue of increasing concern to school psychologists, educators, and parents. Here an ecological approach is proposed to enhance our understanding of how personal, interpersonal, and sociocultural factors contribute to the increased risk for suicide among adolescents. The ecological approach allows exploration of how adolescent suicide is determined by multiple factors related to the adolescent's personal history or ontogenic development (e.g., depression), the influences of those individuals with whom adolescents have immediate contact with, or the microsystems (e.g., family and school), the larger social units, or the exosystems, that indirectly influence adolescents (e.g., media), and the larger culture or macrosystems (e.g., cultural differences in attitudes about suicide). In this article the interaction of several factors within and between the permeable boundaries of each of the layers of the ecological paradigm is also highlighted. Finally, examples of intervention and prevention strategies at each level of the system are set forth.

The authors investigated the prevalence and predictors of subjective well-being (SWB) in a particular Middle Eastern culture: that of Lebanon. The authors examined personality constructs of self-esteem, optimism, and positive affect in relation to SWB. The authors surveyed a sample of 689 individuals between the ages of 17 and 24 by using four instruments with established cross-cultural validity: (a) the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS; E. Diener, R. Emmons, R. J. Larsen, & S. Griffin, 1985), (b) the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS; D. Watson, L. A. Clark, & A. Tellegen, 1988), (c) the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSE; M. Rosenberg, 1965), and (d) the revised Life Orientation Test (LOT-R; M. F. Scheier, C. S. Carver, & M. W. Bridges, 1994). The results indicated that college youth's SWB was positively correlated with self-esteem, optimism, and positive affect. Examining the demographic variable of gender, the authors found that men had higher scores on positive affect than did women. A trend emerged that suggested that language dominance and socioeconomic status were associated with SWB levels. The results suggest that internal personality constructs are more predictive of satisfaction with life than are demographic variables.

In this study whether people with different individualistic and collectivistic (I-C) tendencies speak different languages, belong to different religious groups, and are of different gender was investigated. These 3 independent variables were examined using data from 517 college students in Lebanon: a multilingual society where both worldviews (I and C) coexist. The Twenty Statement Test, Triandis' Attitude items, and 10 of Schwartz's Value items were used to empirically test the I-C orientations and the above variables. Results indicated that language plays a primary role in individuals' orientations; respondents who used the Arabic language were consistently more collectivist than those who used either English or French. The discussion focused on the role of second language, specifically, English or French, which when learned by Arabic native speakers, enhanced the accessibility of private self-cognitions. Religion seemed to impact individuals' orientations in certain domains, but not consistently. Gender did not appear to be of significance in I-C orientation in this study.

The study investigated three subjective wellbeing (SWB) components, namely positive affect (PA), negative affect (NA), and life satisfaction (LS), along with optimism and self-esteem and their association with academic achievement and multilinguality in a sample of 1401 Lebanese university students. As predicted, optimism and self-esteem correlated positively with LS and PA, and negatively with NA. Optimism, self-esteem and each of the SWB components jointly predicted academic achievement (GPA), with PA being an individually significant positive predictor. There were differences in the five key variables across language groups, specifically between Arabic-only speakers and some other groups: Compared Arabic-only speakers, bilingual speakers of Arabic and either English or French scored higher on self-esteem, PA and optimism, and lower on NA, while trilingual speakers of Arabic, English, and French scored higher on self-esteem, PA and LS. Language grouping was a significant predictor of the SWB components, optimism, and self-esteem even when controlling for GPA, socioeconomic status (SES), and religion. Lastly, the relevance of SES and religion for the prediction of SWB is discussed, and implications and future research questions are advanced.

This article examines the status of school counseling in Lebanon. An overview that points out some weakness in the educational system, such as high dropout and repetition rates, is presented. Calls for counseling have been voiced partly because of the psychological consequences of social change, such as political instability in Lebanon. A sample of school counselors in public and private schools were surveyed. Private school counselors reported fewer stressors and more rewards than did their counterparts in public schools.