A Critical Assessment of the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study at 20 Years

McEwen, Craig A.; Gregerson, Scout F.

doi:10.1016/j.amepre.2018.10.016

Cited by 108 publications

(93 citation statements)

References 23 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Other controversies include whether a simple count of the number of adversities in childhood should be the prime determinant of whether or not children receive services, which service providers and settings are best-suited for screening, and whether screening should be conducted when evidencebased supports and therapies are not available to children with a positive screen (Finkelhor, 2018;McEwen & Gregerson, 2019;Murphey & Bartlett, 2019). There has been particularly vigorous debate about how childhood adversity should be defined and operationalized for screening individual children.…”

Section: Screening For Adverse Childhood Experiences (Aces)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…And, if so, the most common or harmful to which groups of children? What seems clear is that, to have relevance to the lives of as many children and families as possible, social-structural adversities must be included along with those related to the family and household (McEwen & Gregerson, 2019;Murphey & Bartlett, 2019). Stressors stemming from social, cultural, and environmental conditions (e.g., extreme poverty, community violence, bullying, discrimination, historical trauma, refugee status) often represent the root causes of other adversities (Pascoe, Wood, Duffee, & AAP Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, Council on Community Pediatrics, 2016) yet are seldom included in screening tools.…”

Section: Type Of Adversitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Stressors stemming from social, cultural, and environmental conditions (e.g., extreme poverty, community violence, bullying, discrimination, historical trauma, refugee status) often represent the root causes of other adversities (Pascoe, Wood, Duffee, & AAP Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, Council on Community Pediatrics, 2016) yet are seldom included in screening tools. Furthermore, excluding such experiences disproportionately affects individuals with a history of being marginalized in society due to race, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status (McEwen & Gregerson, 2019;Murphey & Bartlett, 2019). Take, for example, a child who flees from violence in her country of origin, is forcibly removed from her parents upon arriving in the USA, and spends several months in a detention center before she is placed in foster care, where she becomes suicidal.…”

Section: Type Of Adversitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Screening for Childhood Adversity: Contemporary Challenges and Recommendations

Bartlett

2020

ADV RES SCI

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Childhood adversity is prevalent in the USA, affecting at least half of all children and youth. Growing awareness of its prevalence and harmful effects on individual health and development over the lifespan has prompted considerable interest among policymakers, program leaders, and other stakeholders in screening individual children for adversity as a first step in preventing and mitigating its negative effects. Given the vulnerability of this population, concerted efforts first should be made to ensure screening for adversity is beneficial to children and minimizes potential harm. Of particular concern is widespread use of screening tools that define adversity narrowly, failing to account for social and structural inequities (e.g., poverty, discrimination, forcible separation from a parent) or to take a child's trauma symptoms, overall development, strengths, and culture into account. Furthermore, screening in the absence of a system for referral and treatment risks being ineffective, and even harmful, to children and their families. This paper reviews major challenges related to developing and selecting tools to screen for childhood adversity, and offers recommendations for a comprehensive, strengths-based, trauma-informed screening approach that incorporates sensitivity to a child's development, environment, and culture.

show abstract

Section: Screening For Adverse Childhood Experiences (Aces)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Type Of Adversitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Type Of Adversitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Screening for Childhood Adversity: Contemporary Challenges and Recommendations

Bartlett

2020

ADV RES SCI

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…However, limitations of the original ACEs Study have also been noted, including an unrepresentative sample and a narrow definition of childhood adversity. [15] Importantly, there has been no theoretical or empirical evidence published to indicate why 10 specific experiences were chosen as ACEs in the original ACEs Study data collection. Even without empirical data, to date, ACEs are typically conceptualized into two constructs: 1) child maltreatment ACEs, including physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, emotional neglect, and physical neglect, and 2) household challenges or dysfunctions, including parental divorce, mother treated violently or exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV), household member with substance use problems, household member with mental health problems, and household member incarceration.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although the original ACE Study has been criticized for using a narrow definition of ACEs, [15] current research should not simply be focused on developing a long and exhaustive list of ACEs. Such a list would be impractical for research and practice.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Confirmatory Factor Analysis of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) among a Community-Based Sample of Parents and Adolescents

Afifi

Salmon

Davila

et al. 2019

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Childhood maltreatment: The role of concurrent advantageous experiences on adolescents' psychosocial adjustment

Ronzón-Tirado

Redondo

Muñoz-Rivas

2022

Aggressive Behavior

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Despite the growing body of evidence concerning the harmful effects of childhood maltreatment, intimate partner violence exposure (IPVE) and their correlates, little is currently known about the effects of co-occurring advantageous family conditions (e.g., instrumental support, inductive parenting, positive communication) and how they may serve to offset the detrimental effects of maltreatment and IPVE. The present study applied a three-step latent class analysis to identify the co-occurrence patterns of childhood maltreatment and advantageous family conditions among 1379 Spanish adolescents. The study also sought to identify the sociodemographic risk markers and psychosocial adjustment associated with each latent class membership. The analyses revealed four classes, namely (1) violent family context, (2) emotionally neglectful family context, (3) adverse and advantageous family conditions, and (4) positive family context.Having a lower socioeconomic status and being a migrant were both risk markers for membership to the violent family context as well as to the adverse and advantageous family conditions class. Adolescents who were exposed to advantageous family conditions (e.g., the positive family context or the adverse and advantageous family conditions) exhibited fewer psychosocial problems (e.g., depression, anxiety, somatisation) and lower frequencies of teen dating violence (TDV) when compared with those in the violent family context. Moreover, membership to the emotionally neglectful family context class was related to more psychological symptoms and a higher prevalence of TDV when compared with membership to the positive family context class, despite the absence of IPVE and maltreatment. Overall, the results provide evidence that advantageous family conditions contribute to better psychosocial adjustment on the part of adolescents even when exposed to IPV and maltreatment. Identifying the experiences that contribute to adolescents' psychosocial adjustment could help clinical and governmental interventions tailor their often-limited resources to children who are at greater risk of negative outcomes.

show abstract

A Critical Assessment of the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study at 20 Years

Cited by 108 publications

References 23 publications

Screening for Childhood Adversity: Contemporary Challenges and Recommendations

Screening for Childhood Adversity: Contemporary Challenges and Recommendations

Confirmatory Factor Analysis of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) among a Community-Based Sample of Parents and Adolescents

Childhood maltreatment: The role of concurrent advantageous experiences on adolescents' psychosocial adjustment

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About