Adverse childhood experiences – characteristics and links with mental disorders, suicidal behaviours and self-injury among children and adolescents

Abstract

Adverse childhood experiences encompass different forms of abuse (physical, emotional, sexual abuse, neglect), household dysfunctions (e.g. mental disorders, substance abuse) and social challenges (e.g. poverty, ethnic discrimination, community or school violence). All these factors contribute to the life-long risk of mental health problems, including mental disorders, suicidal behaviour and self-harm. Children and adolescents exposed to various forms of adverse events are more than four times more likely to develop mental disorders already before adulthood and to suffer from psychopathology that will persist into adulthood. The majority of research on the relationships between adverse childhood experiences and mental disorders have been conducted among adults and assessed the role of isolated factors. Therefore, it seems reasonable to assess the impact of adverse childhood experiences on the functioning of children and adolescents, with particular emphasis on at least several co-occurring factors related to both abuse and household dysfunctions. The most commonly considered theoretical concept of the origin of disorders, i.e. the diathesis–stress model, emphasises the role of interaction between genetic predispositions and environmental factors, assuming that a combination of individual predispositions and exposure to stress arising from adverse events increases the risk of psychopathological symptoms. In turn, contemporary mental health models take into account the role of mutual interactions between risk factors and protective factors, as particularly reflected in the concept of resilience. More recent approaches point to the dynamics of relationships between adverse childhood experiences and mental disorders, and at the same time to the limitations of inference from the available research.