| Summary: | <i>Background.</i> Exposure to fictional suicide scenes raises concerns about the risk of suicide contagion. However, researchers and clinicians still lack empirical evidence to estimate this risk. Here, we propose a theory-grounded tool that measures properties related to aberrant identification and suicidal contagion of potentially harmful suicide scenes. <i>Methods.</i> The items of the <i>Movies and Video: Identification and Emotions in reaction to Suicide</i> (MoVIES) operationalize the World Health Organization’s recommendations for media coverage of suicide, and were adapted and completed with identification theory principles and cinematographic evidence. Inter-rater reliability (Cohen’s kappa) and internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) were estimated and optimized for two series of 19 and 30 randomly selected movies depicting a suicide scene. The validity of the scale in predicting identification with the suicidal character was tested in nine unknowledgeable participants who watched seven suicide movie scenes each. <i>Results</i>. The MoVIES indicated satisfying psychometric properties with kappas measured at 0.7 or more for every item and a global internal consistency of [α = 0.05]. The MoVIES score significantly predicted participants’ strength of identification independently from their baseline empathy ((β = 0.20), <i>p</i> < 0.05). <i>Conclusions</i>. The MoVIES is available to scholars as a valid, reliable, and useful tool to estimate the amount of at-risk components of fictional suicidal behavior depicted in films, series, or television shows.
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