Urdu Research Articles

Cross-cultural adaptation and validation of an Urdu version of the Vaccine Attitudes Examination (VAX-U) scale.

Martin and Petrie developed the Vaccine Attitudes Examination (VAX) scale with an aim to document general vaccination attitudes. Vaccine acceptance plays an important role in curbing COVID-19 infections. Thus, it was important to assess vaccination attitudes of Pakistani people towards novel COVID-19 vaccines. The VAX scale was not available in Urdu language for Pakistani population. The study aimed to carry out cross-cultural adaptation and validation of an Urdu version of the Vaccine Attitude Examination (VAX) scale in a selected population sample from Pakistan. A cross sectional study was conducted in September 2021 in an outpatient department of a healthcare facility in Karachi, Pakistan. Adult visitors, eligible for COVID-19 vaccine and spoke Urdu as first language were invited. Convenient sampling was used, and sample size was based on an item response ratio of 1:20. An Urdu version of the VAX scale was developed. The reliability was assessed using Cronbach's alpha (α) and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). The model fitness was evaluated using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and fit indices namely goodness of fit index (GFI), adjusted goodness of fit index (AGFI), Tucker Lewis index (TLI), comparative fit index (CFI), and root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA). A structural equation model (SEM) was also developed. IBM SPSS and AMOS were used to analyse the data. The study had ethical clearance. A total of 211 responses were analysed. The reliability (Cronbach's α) was 0.821. The ICC was 0.831 (95% CI: 0.795-0.863). CFA using a 4-factor model revealed the following values for fit indices; GFI = 0.944, AGFI = 0.909, TLI = 0.953, CFI = 0.966, and RMSEA = 0.051. All values reported were in the acceptable range. The VAX Urdu version is a reliable and valid instrument for use in an Urdu speaking population and will enable clinicians to assess the public's attitude towards general vaccination including COVID-19 vaccination. Clinicians can use the VAX-U to document a person's vaccine hesitancy and tailor their counselling to address the issues in vaccine uptake.

A Systematic Investigation of Tobacco Industry Sourced Data Relating to Illicit Tobacco Trade Featured in Pakistan's Media Coverage (2015-2020).

Previous evidence suggests the tobacco industry uses media to disseminate misleading narratives relating to illicit tobacco trade (ITT) as part of efforts to influence policy outcomes. Such evidence is largely high-income countries (HIC) focused, resulting in a literature gap for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Pakistan and its annual budget cycle are used as a case study for addressing this gap. Electronic English-language articles from newspapers in Pakistan (328) were sourced from LexisNexis and a sub-sample of Urdu-language electronic articles (12) were identified through internet searches. The articles were published between 2015 and 2020 and included claims/estimates relating to ITT, which were coded to identify cited data sources. Changes in media coverage before and after Pakistan's annual budget announcements were explored via Wilcoxon signed rank and Poisson regression tests. Of the 357 claims/estimates analyzed, 66 (20%) were industry-funded. The most prevalent sources were national government bodies (36.6%) and tobacco companies or their representatives (15.1%). Wilcoxon signed-rank and Poisson regression tests on the frequency of English-language articles both created a p-value of < .05 for the frequency of relevant articles between the months of April and May, compared to the other months, indicating statistical significance. There was a statistically significant increase in the number of English-language articles featuring claims/estimates relating to Pakistan's ITT in the months leading up to the annual budget each year. The government should consider measures to improve transparency standards within media coverage and promote factcheck journalism to safeguard against industry tactics to manipulate public discourses. This paper is, to the best of our knowledge, the largest exploration of the use of data sourced from the tobacco industry within a country's media that has been undertaken to date, utilizing a team of seven coders across the United Kingdom and Pakistan. Our findings reveal weaknesses within media coverage of ITT in Pakistan, both in English and Urdu language publications. We encourage the government to consider new standards to enhance transparency and promote factcheck journalism within media coverage in the country.

An Extended Pattern Based Comprehensive Stemmer for the Urdu Language

The Urdu language is used by approximately 200 million people for spoken and written communications on a daily basis. There is a substantial amount of unstructured Urdu textual data that is available worldwide. Data mining techniques can be used to extract meaningful knowledge from such a large, potentially informative source of data. There are many text processing systems available to process unstructured textual data. However, these systems are mostly language specific and developed for a variety of languages such as English, Spanish, Chinese, etc. Unfortunately, there are not as many language processing resources available for Urdu. Stemming is one of the most important preprocessing steps in the text mining process and its goal is to reduce grammatical words form, e.g., parts of speech, gender, tense, and so on, to their root form. In this work, we have extended the stemming capabilities of our existing pattern-based comprehensive stemming system for Urdu text. In addition to the existing stemming rules in previous work, we introduce novel stemming rules for prefix, and infix stemming. We also optimize the existing suffix removal rules and extend the add character lists for word normalization. These stemming rules are generic and have the ability to generate the stem of Urdu words as well as loan words (words belonging to other languages i.e. Arabic, Persian, Turkish, etc). In the experimental evaluation, we have observed a significant improvement in the overall stemming accuracy of our proposed pattern-based Urud stemmer, which demonstrates the adoptability of the proposed stemming approach for a variety of text-processing applications.

Coverage of Women's Empowerment Issue in Pakistani Newspapers: An Agenda-Setting Perspective

In the current research, a quantitative content analysis of four leading newspapers Dawn, Daily Times, Nawa-i-waqt, and Daily Jang was conducted to investigate the patterns of coverage of women empowerment. The time period for this study consisted of November 2023 to April 2024. The results showed that Urdu newspapers gave more coverage to the issue at hand as compared to English newspapers and Nawa-i-waqt gave the maximum amount of news regarding women empowerment as compared to other newspapers. The outcome of this research revealed that Pakistani Urdu newspapers give suitable coverage to women empowerment-related news, although different newspapers use different agendas to portray news related to women empowerment, such as political empowerment, social empowerment, economic empowerment, and education empowerment. The results showed that more importance was given to political and social empowerment and the common agenda of these four newspapers was social and political empowerment.

Understanding the Effects of Post-Covid-19 Challenges on Employee Job Satisfaction and Job Performance in Café- Restaurants, Islamabad Pakistan; a Phenomenological Study

Current research is about Understanding the effect of post-Covid-19 challenges on employee job satisfaction and job performance in cafe-restaurants in Islamabad, Pakistan. The purpose of this research is to explore the challenge on the job satisfaction and performance after Corona virus. The qualitative inquiry method used phenomenological strategies with a post-positivist paradigm. A semi-structured face to face interview tool with open-ended questions was used. Analyze these questions by using thematic analysis approaches. Interview held in Urdu Language. Data were collected from six different three- and four-star cafe-restaurants. 15 interviewees shared their thoughts and satisfied questions with their answers in Urdu. Finding highlighted 12 major themes including psychological Changes after COVID-19, operational changes, assistance by Organization, changes in Role, communication, novelty in working environment, change in performance level, employee remarks regarding satisfaction, survivor sickness, sustainer, work attitude and effects of media. Participants practiced and research observed that Covid challenged the satisfaction and relationship and found decline in satisfaction and improvement in performance. Employees of Café-restaurant are not satisfied with their working conditions but still struggle to enhance their performance. Employees shared their feelings and practice and noted that a satisfied employee is not always a good performer, there are some other reasons also.

Media Coverage of Smog in Punjab: A Comparative Study of Urdu and English Dailies

This research explores the media coverage of smog in Punjab, with a specific focus on Faisalabad city, employing a qualitative research methodology guided by the social learning theory. Smog, a pervasive environmental concern, poses significant challenges to public health and the ecosystem. Understanding how media, in both Urdu and English languages, frames and disseminates information about smog is essential in addressing this pressing environmental issue. The study's central objective is to investigate how language and cultural context influence media portrayals of smog in Urdu and English dailies within the Faisalabad region. This research endeavors to uncover the factors contributing to media narratives surrounding smog. Employing qualitative research techniques, the study seeks to discern the underlying dynamics that influence the framing of smog-related issues in the media, ultimately contributing to more informed environmental discourse and policy initiatives in Punjab.

Critique of Colonialism and Cultural Imperialism in Selected Poems of Tanveer Anjum from Nai Zaban Kay Huroof Alphabet of a New Language

Postcolonial complexity of thought is an integral discourse in Pakistani writers’ works. Tanveer Anjum is a contemporary Pakistani Urdu poetess and her poetry is perceptive of personal, social and political concerns of modern times. In a postcolonial country, the colonial past is never detached from the common consciousness and the unending imperialism and post war traumas are part of its subjects’ collective memories. Five poems are selected from her recent collection of Urdu poetry, Nai Zaban kay Huroof (Alphabet of a New Language) for the postcolonial analysis. The poems are: ‘Interview’, ‘There Was a Village’, ‘The Last Nail’, ‘Sister Caroline’s Dappled Cats’ and ‘Like Sunbeams’. The research is qualitative in nature and the theories of Edward Said and Homi K. Bhabha are used for the textual analysis of the selected poems. The analysis reveals a parallel structure of thoughts in her poems which at one side endorses the need of cultural resistance and on the other, calls for a negotiation, which further affirms the complexities of postcolonial thought process.

Linguistic discussions of Urdu Language

The beginning and evolution of Urdu language is a controversial issue in our country. The research and editing of linguists regarding the early characteristics of Urdu language and its development is still going on. First, European historians researched and edited linguistics and presented their ideas. These theories were an early reference, hence their importance to Islam. Subsequent researchers and linguists carried on the same work. The beginning of the twentieth century marks the beginning of a vernacular period of linguistic research. During this period, there is a tendency to assign Urdu to a particular place or place. Many researchers have traced the traces of Urdu in the Mughal period. Among them, Mera Man, Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, Maulana Sohbai, Shamsullah Qadri and Maulana Muhammad Hussain Azad are worth mentioning. And some say it is a Dravidian language and some say Urdu is the daughter of Braj Bhasha. There are many theories about the origin of the Urdu language, but it is not entirely correct to connect it with any one region.

Mir Gul Khan Naseers’ Urdu Poetry: Unveiling hid Poetic Brilliance

The Balochistan region is home to speakers and understanders of numerous languages. The inhabitants of Balochistan are not fully conversant in Urdu, even in this day and age of print and electronic media. About 80 years ago, Mir Gul Khan Naseer brought the scent of Urdu language to the people living in this desolate region. In the color of Urdu poetry, Balochistan was rather a boring tone before him. He may not be a native speaker, yet his poetry in Urdu has a unique fluidity and elegance. His works accurately capture the circumstances and happenings around him. His use of similes and details writing has elevated his poetry’s elegance. He has a whole system of tips and tricks and a jingle of Hindi words can also be heard in his expression.

TRANSLATION AND VALIDATION OF URDU VERSION OF BRIEF DISSOCIATIVE EXPERIENCE SCALE FOR SUBSTANCE USE DISORDER IN PAKISTAN

Objective Dissociation is a ubiquitous construct in psychology and is of high clinical relevance. The objective of this study was to translate and validate the Brief Dissociative Experience Scale (DES-B) in the Urdu language for individuals with substance use disorder (SUD). DesignThis was a cross sectional study. Place and Duration of StudyThe study was conducted with a sample of 200 individuals with SUD aged 18 and above from drug rehabilitation centres across Pakistan between July to November 2023. MethodsThis study utilized a rigorous procedure of Mapi guidelines for translation and validation of DES-B. The validation of DES-B was determined through confirmatory factor analysis. ResultsThe data was analyzed using SPSS and AMOS software and factor structure, internal consistency, composite reliability, and convergent validity of the scale were determined. Of the 200 participants, 79.0% were male. The mean age of the participants was 30.61 years (SD = 8.87) with a range between 18 to 65. The findings indicated a good model fit for a one-factor structure with 8 items (χ²/df = 2.61, p &lt; 0.00, RMSEA = 0.089, CFI = 0.908, GFI = 0.944). Moreover, the composite reliability (CR = .77), convergent validity (AVE = .31), and internal consistency (α =.76) showed favorable results. Overall, the Urdu version of DES-B demonstrated acceptable results in terms of the construct’s validity and reliability. ConclusionThe Urdu version of DES-B can be used as a reliable and valid tool to assess dissociative experiences in individuals with SUD suitable for research and clinical settings.

Tobacco Craving Questionnaire Short Version: Translation and Validation in Urdu

Tobacco Craving Questionnaire is a very important measure and is widely used in many countries to measure tobacco craving among cigarette smokers. But unfortunately, most of the cigarette smokers in Pakistan do not know about English language and therefore it was a need to translate the Tobacco Craving Questionnaire into the Urdu language. Cross-Sectional survey design has been used. Forward and backward translation was conducted on a sample of 40 cigarette smokers. Both SPSS (Version-26) and AMOS (Version-10) have been used for data analysis. Descriptive statistics and alpha reliability analysis were conducted on the scale. To verify the validity of the scale, 500 smokers were included in a sample and subjected to Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). The scale's Cronbach alpha reliability was 0.73 which indicated satisfactory reliability. 11 items from the translated Urdu version of the Tobacco Craving Questionnaire were validated by Confirmatory Factor Analysis. In CFA item number 9 was excluded from the model because it explained zero regression weight. Reliability and validity were confirmed in the findings of the study of the translated Urdu version of the questionnaire. Tobacco Craving Questionnaire Short Version (TCQ-SF) among Pakistani habitual smokers has been verified by translation and cross-lingual validation of the Pakistani version of the scale and confirmed its cross-cultural use. The findings have significant implications for Pakistan's indigenous population.

A Novel Approach for Sentiment Analysis of a Low Resource Language Using Deep Learning Models

Sentiment analysis is a process of dealing with people's opinions, remarks, and comments to extract valuable insights from them. Sentiment analysis can be used for various purposes like market analysis, campaign monitoring, decision-making, etc. In recent years, there has been much research on sentiment classification, particularly in English. However, these existing approaches used for the English language cannot be applied to the Urdu language. The substantial rise in communication traffic, including audio, text, video, and pictures, has significantly shifted the Internet of Things (IoT) from scalar to Multimedia Internet of Things (MIoT). So far, the integration of MIoT and NLP systems has received less attention, but it has evolved as a novel research paradigm for smart applications. This article proposes deep learning techniques for sentence-level Urdu sentiment analysis (Urdu SA) for MIoT. Our approach consists of various phases, i.e., data gathering, text preprocessing, model training, testing, and evaluation. A data set of 25 thousand Urdu reviews are used for training the proposed models. This data set is built by scraping various Urdu blogs and social media platforms, and some part of the IMDB data set is used after translating it into the Urdu language. Native Urdu speakers do data annotation, and various preprocessing techniques, i.e., tokenization, stemming, etc., are applied. The two deep learning models, i.e., Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) and Long Short-term Memory (LSTM), are trained on preprocessed Urdu reviews to find their sentiments in this article. Both models are tested using various combinations of hyperparameters, and each model's accuracy and F1 scores are evaluated. The study results show that the LSTM model outperforms the CNN model by achieving a 96% accuracy and 91% F1 score.

IMPACT OF OCCUPATIONAL POWER AND SOCIAL STATUS DEPICTED IN PAKISTANI TV DRAMAS: A SOCIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS

This research paper is based on how our Pakistani TV dramas portray occupational power and social status through their distinctive setting. Through a sociological analysis, we explored the issue of why Pakistani TV dramas depict typical appearances and specific kinds of dressing to represent a particular social class, e.g., shalwar kameez for the poor and jeans for the rich. Even professional careers such as schoolteachers for the middle class and fashion designers for the upper class are based upon the same factors. A character’s typical background and belongings are also used to show his social status, e.g., in most dramas, middle-class men wear slippers, and the rich wear branded shoes, sunglasses, and watches. In this study, we argue that the depiction of social class is often biased and does not precisely reflect reality. This significantly impacts the viewers’ minds. This visual representation is evident in Pakistani Urdu television dramas of the past ten years. Using a qualitative research design, we collected our data through in-depth interviews to evaluate the social impact of these visual representations. The paper also supports George Gerbner’s Cultivation Analysis theory and its arguments, proving how TV dramas directly impact heavy viewers’ minds, reflecting their behavior.

Translation, cross-cultural adaptation and validation of psychometric properties of foot function index in Urdu-speaking population with ankle and foot disorders

BackgroundFoot and ankle problems are frequently prevalent, especially among the elderly, ranging from 70 to 80%. In primary care, foot, and ankle complaints stand out as one of the most frequent reasons for orthopedic consultations. Patient-reported outcome measures are significant in the assessment burden of any condition on the effects of intervention as well as research. The Foot Function Index (FFI) is a region-specific tool that was identified as one of the most commonly used evaluation tools for foot complaints. This study aimed to translate, cross-cultural adapt, and test the psychometric properties of FFI in the Urdu language.MethodologyThe FFI was translated into Urdu language (FFI-U) following Beaton et al. translation guidelines. The data were collected from 230 Urdu-speaking participants with different foot and ankle pathologies. Data collection started after the written informed consent from the participants. All participants completed the FFI-U, Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), SF-36, and the Foot and Ankle Outcome Score (FAOS) at baseline while only 30 participants completed ULFI-U after one week for test-retest reliability. The psychometric properties involved reliability and validity testing. Reliability was assessed where internal consistency was measured using Cronbach’s alpha and test-retest reliability through the intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC). FFI-U was tested for face validity and construct validity (convergent and discriminant). Psychometric criteria were examined against priori hypotheses, and alpha level (p-value < 0.05) was considered statistically significant.ResultsFFI-U demonstrated good reliability with internal consistency (α = 0.86) and test-retest reliability with intra-class correlation coefficient = 0.845 (0.78–0.89). A moderate correlation was found using Pearson correlation between FFI-U total score and physical components of SF-36, VAS (pain, disability), and FAOS (γ= -0.65, 0.72, 0.71, -0.68) respectively, indicating convergent validity however, a weak correlation was found with mental components of SF-36 (γ=-0.25) demonstrating discriminant validity. Face validity was assessed at the pre-final testing stage by interviewing patients. There were no floor and ceiling effects found for FFI-U.ConclusionThe FFI-U has been found reliable, valid, and feasible tool to be used as a patient-reported outcome measure to assess functional levels with different foot and ankle disorders in Urdu speaking population.

Political Critiques and Power Dynamics within Pakistani Society: A Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) of Pakistani Drama "Ishq Murshid"

This research paper proposes examining postmodern political power in the Pakistani Urdu television drama “Ishq Murshid” (2023), employing Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) as its theoretical framework that is utilized to examine how the drama reflects, reinforces, and critiques political matters and power dynamics within Pakistani society. The study's main objective is to analyze how the selected drama portrays political power, ideology, and resistance and examine the implications of political narratives and political realities in Pakistani discourse. This study is based on the qualitative method and systematically identifies and interprets political discourse within the political narrative, exploring the themes of authority, power, corruption, and social injustices represented in all the episodes of “Ishq Murshid.”. This study uses the tools and techniques for analysis including thematic coding, discourse markers identification, and critical contextualization of dialogues and narrative structures. The study aims to contribute to understanding the media's role in shaping and reflecting political discourse in South Asia, mainly through the lens of popular Urdu drama. The findings of the study of “Ishq-e-Murshid” critique Pakistan's political and social structures, highlighting corruption, moral resistance, and power dynamics. It critiques stereotypes, societal mistrust, and the role of family and legacy.

Prevalence of Physical Abuse Among Adolescent with Hearing Impairment

The current study was conducted to explore the level of physical abuse faced by adolescents with hearing impairment. A correlation research design was used. The population for this study comprised the students of (grades 5th-10th) age range (12-18) studying in special education schools and centers of the Gujranwala division. A sample of 350 adolescents with hearing impairment (male 186, female 164) was selected using stratified random sampling for this study. ICAST-1 scale was developed by ISPCAN (2015) for physical abuse and was used for data collection 19 items were selected for physical abuse and validated their content validity by experts. The scale was translated into Urdu and validated by the Urdu language experts. Data was analyzed by reporting frequencies and levels of physical abuse. The findings of this study indicate that almost 90% of the adolescents with hearing impairment were facing moderate levels of physical abuse. The majority face moderate physical abuse in the form of being put in time out, shaken aggressively, pinched to cause pain, locked up or restricted movement, kicking, crushed fingers, and threats with a knife/to hurt or kill you as punishment. We need to reconsider the myth of using punishment to improve children's learning and behavior.

Aspect-based sentiment analysis in Urdu language: resource creation and evaluation

Aspect-based sentiment analysis in Urdu language: resource creation and evaluation

Role Of Proficiency In Source Language Activation While Learning English Lexemes In A Cross-Linguistic Context

The study aimed to address the lexemic cross-linguistic influence (CLI) mechanism and the role of proficiency in activating the source language of influence. The multilingual, Gujari-speaking English lexical learner participated in the study through the discourse completion tasks and self-assessment tests. The study identified evidence of lexemic influence[1] from already learned languages at form and concept levels while English lexical items were used. The study found that Urdu as L2 offered a facilitative role compared to Gujari and Pahari in influencing learning English vocabulary as Ln. The results indicate that L2 Urdu serves as the primary source of lexemic influence on English (Ln), which is shaped by the higher level of proficiency in the Urdu Language. Hence, the pattern of influence was from higher to higher and Urdu as an L2 also functions as a filter for other language features when acquiring L3 lexemes.

APPLICATION OF THEMATIC ROLES IN URDU SENTENCE STRUCTURE

This research aims at exploring theta roles- theoretical entities in the Urdu language that are very crucial in enabling one to Account for relations between verbs and their associated arguments. This is explained by the elaborate framework of theta roles that are commonly used, and consist of the Agent, Theme, Goal, Source, Experiencer, Patient and Instrument. For instance, in the case of “He is reading the book,” while the Agent role refers to the performer of an action, the Experiencer role refers to the passive experience as it is illustrated in “I am hungry.” This paper provides a way of differentiating and studying the intricate relationship between various features of the Urdu language. However, in order to investigate this issue more vigorously, the research also applies Chomsky’s minimalist agenda. Analyzing the studied theories in the given program, this investigation provides a more detailed interpretation of the structural and semantic characteristics of Urdu, greatly increasing the awareness of the language’s sophistication.

Urdu-Language Translation and Validation of the Ask Suicide-Screening Questions (ASQ) Tool: A Focus on Connotation and Context.

Background Suicide is a significant cause of death in the world, and Pakistan, a low- and middle-income country, is no exception. Despite the increasing number of suicides, Pakistan does not have a validated suicide risk screening tool to identify suicide risk in the national language, Urdu, accurately. This study aims to translate and validate the Ask Suicide-Screening Questions (ASQ) tool into Urdu for suicide risk screening in Pakistan. Methodology We conducted this study at the Services Institute of Medical Sciences (SIMS), a large teaching hospital in Lahore, Pakistan, after receiving the approval of the SIMS Institutional Review Board. The study used a cross-sectional instrument validation study design. The inclusion criteria were youth and adults of both sexes aged 15-45 years, with an ability to understand, speak, read, and write in the Urdu language, who had no cognitive or intellectual limitation to consenting, and who were medically stable to participate. Exclusion criteria included any medical, physical, or cognitive unstable condition to consent or participate. We enrolled 300 participants in our convenience sample from the emergency department (ED), inpatient, and outpatient settings. The ASQ and the ASQ Brief Suicide Safety Assessment (BSSA) were translated and back-translated by Urdu language experts and modified to accommodate cultural and linguistic nuances. The clinician-administered BSSA Urdu version was used as a standard criterion to validate the ASQ by comparing the ASQ-Urdu responses vs. BSSA-Urdu responses. RStudio (version 2023.09.1+494) was used for statistical analyses Results The sample had an enrollment rate of 99.7% (300/301). The sample was 52% female (158/300); the mean age was 27.1 years (SD = 9.4), the overall screen-positive rate was 41.7% (125/300), and 9.3% (28/300) of the participants endorsed a past suicide attempt. In our sample, 35.9% (33/92) of outpatients, 32.2% (19/59) of inpatients, and 49.0% (73/149) of ED patients screened positive on the Urdu ASQ. The screen-positive rate was 16.9% (10/59) for participants aged 17 years and younger, 40.7% (35/86) for participants aged 18 to 25 years, and 51.6% (80/155) for participants aged 26 years and older. Compared to the criterion standard clinician-administered assessment, the Urdu ASQ had a sensitivity of 94.2% (95% confidence interval (CI) = 85.8%-98.4%), a specificity of 73.9% (95% CI = 67.7%-79.5%), a negative predictive value of 97.7% (95% CI = 94.2%-99.1%), and a positive predictive value of 52.0% (95% CI = 46.4%-57.6%). Conclusions The Urdu ASQ has strong psychometric properties, allowing healthcare professionals in Pakistan and worldwide with Urdu-speaking diaspora to identify individuals at risk for suicide efficiently. Utilizing cultural contexts in adapted screening tools improves the accuracy of suicide detection by ensuring that the tools are relevant, sensitive, and respectful to the cultural context of the individuals being assessed. High screen-positive rates in our pilot study underscore the need for early detection and intervention of suicide as a major global public health problem.