In this study of a population of junior and senior high school students in a mid-sized, Western city, adolescent emotional and ideological disparity with parents and disparity between the importance the adolescent placed on academic achievement and satisfaction with academic achievement were linked to suicide ideation through the intervening variables of self-esteem, purpose in life, and two forms of deviant behaviour--alcohol use and eating disorder. Self-confidence and the deviant behaviours of delinquency and drug use did not prove to be meaningful intervening variables.