Suicide Worsens Neurocognitive Functioning Family history of suicide attempts in the children and adolescents worsens their neurocognitive functioning such as, lower executive functioning, shorter attention spans, and poorer language reasoning as compared to those without a family history, as per a largest study by researchers from the Lifespan Brain Institute (LiBI) of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and the University of Pennsylvania, published in The Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. 3,507 youth aged 8 to 21, divided into test groups and matched by age, sex, race, and lifetime depression were enrolled in the study. Among them, 501 participants had a family history of suicide.