The Growing Imprint of Childhood Trauma

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In the US, it is estimated that 1 in 4 children will witness violence at home. This means that most people in the US will likely have contact, in some form, with children who are experiencing trauma. It is an issue that impacts everyone, even if not directly in the majority of your day to day life. Unfortunately for many, it does hit closer to home. The occurrence of family violence is rarely a standalone event, meaning there are usually multiple types of violence within the entire family unit. Also, trauma is not a standalone event- meaning the impacts of it often ripple from those traumatized to those they interact with each day.

ACES- Adverse Childhood Experiences

According to a 2020 report from the CDC (Centers for Disease Control & Prevention) over 60% of adults have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience and 16% have had four or more, with women and minorities being at the highest risk. An adverse childhood experience is often referred to as an ACE. It is part of a unit of measuring exposure to violence in one’s childhood. Research has shown that exposure to more ACES increases risks for many physical and mental illnesses across your lifespan. The ACES study began in 1998 and initially sampled largely white, middle-class families. To date, it lacks the data looking at racial inequalities and exposure to racism, which would likely increase rates of impact on physical and mental health.

When I’ve discussed chronic and complex trauma (CPTSD) in previous blogs, it is often in reference to individuals that have experienced multiple ACES and have endured these experiences over time in their childhood. ACES scores of 6 and higher are reported to reduce life expectancy by 20 years, according to the CDC.

Learn more about the impacts of trauma at the neurodevelopmental level in next weeks blog.

Prevalence of Exposure

In 2020, the Department of Justice estimated that 1 in 4 children in the US will be exposed to family violence in their lifetime and according to the CDC- of all the domestic violence reports made each year, an estimated 68-80% will include children (at least) witnessing the event. In 2020, the Department of Health and Human Services reported that almost 4 million child maltreatment cases were opened in the US and in those, over 77% involved the parent as the perpetrator.

Children are most likely to be abused by parents or someone close to them that had been entrusted with their care. The fears of stranger danger are statistically less likely than the danger of one’s home. It’s also widely understood that family violence, whether directed at another adult or a child, is widely underreported while members still live in the same household. Many mental health clinicians feared the possible growth of family violence as Covid kept more members at home without the opportunity for intervention from teachers, doctors, therapists, or others that may be able to notice and report victimization. It can be hard to get a current rate of childhood exposure to family violence in the US, partly because of the impacts of covid on recent studies as well as understood underreporting of victimization while victims still live in violent households. Keep in mind that 2020 reports include data from the years prior- it is generally believed that the rates in the statistics provided above are realistically higher today.

Community Impacts

There is a generational impact of trauma. Often individuals in chronically unstable homes are not learning emotional regulation skills. They can learn maladaptive coping responses and may model this dysregulation in their future family structures. There is often a “trickle-down effect” of family trauma. Trauma also branches out to impact our community. It can lead to different types of interactions with our neighbors, family, friends, customers, co-workers, and classmates. Remember, trauma is rarely a solitary impact- we just might not be aware that it is what we’re interacting with in others. Addressing trauma at a community level is a important. One of the best impacts on trauma processing is having supportive social systems. If the source of trauma is one’s home, the relief can be one’s community.

The long-term health impacts of chronic trauma impact our community’s infrastructure as well. It puts strain on our physical and mental healthcare systems. Also, the cost of long-term health care impacts the viability of future households and their ability to support their own family as well as economically interact with their community. It impacts our school systems, placing more focus in classrooms to address the ever growing mental health needs of students. It increases stress on staff, teachers, and those individuals that are key sources of support to the youth that experience these traumas.

Addressing Future Impacts

We learn to regulate our emotions by learning from others- modeling of health emotional regulation is key to its development. As you can see, trauma backgrounds are very common. Many households aren’t modeling good emotional regulation, leaving children to struggle with healthy regulation of their own. Having systems in place to recognize and intervene in events of abuse are essential, but often have their own failings. All professionals working with children should have training at recognizing and addressing trauma on a basic level. Also, having a school environment and social connections that foster emotional regulation can be a key in addressing the epidemic that is childhood trauma on a daily basis. Access to mental health information as well as direct care through therapists, psychiatrists, and social workers is also critical to addressing trauma’s impacts and reducing risks of future physical and mental health disorders. This is a major focus of this website and blogs- to increase mental health awareness so individuals can have a better understanding of what is happening to them in their body, brain, and thoughts and have more tools to address it. The remaining trauma blogs of this month will focus on the developmental impacts of trauma on your body/brain and the types of trauma treatment options out there.