CSA is a traumatic childhood life event in which the negative consequences increase with increasing severity of abuse. CSA adversely influences a number of adult developmental outcomes that span: mental disorders, psychological wellbeing, sexual risk-taking, physical health and socioeconomic wellbeing. While the individual effect sizes for CSA typically range from small to moderate, it is clear that accumulative adverse effects on adult developmental outcomes are substantial.

After adjustment for confounding, robust and reciprocal associations were found between mental health problems and life satisfaction. Overall, this study showed evidence that life satisfaction influences mental disorder, and that mental disorder influences life satisfaction.

The findings reinforce the importance of the individual/family context in which adolescent depression occurs. When contextual factors and probable maturational effects are taken into account the direct effects of adolescent depression on functioning in mature adulthood appear to be very modest.

The present findings support both social causation and social selection arguments, by indicating that unemployment plays a causal role in substance misuse, and that it is also likely that a reverse causal process whereby substance misuse increases the risk of unemployment.

The findings of this study suggest that exposure to unemployment had small but pervasive effects on psychosocial adjustment in adolescence and young adulthood.