Transgenerational aspects of former Swiss child laborers: do second generations suffer from their parents’ adverse early-life experiences?

Abstract

BackgroundRecent research suggests that childhood adversity exerts a lasting impact not only on the affected individuals but also on their offspring. Little is known about the role of parental rearing behavior in the transgenerational conveyance of parental childhood adversity and filial psychological health.ObjectiveHence, it was the aim of the current study to investigate the relationship between parental rearing behavior of former Swiss indentured child laborers (“Verdingkinder”) and psychological health of their adult offspring.MethodsWe applied a two-generation control-group design with two parental samples (n=16, former “Verdingkinder,” Mage=76.13, SD=6.81 and n=19, parental controls, Mage=72.63, SD=5.96) and their offspring (n=21, former “Verdingkinder” offspring, Mage=52.91, SD=5.90, and n=29 offspring controls, Mage=44.55, SD=7.71). Parental rearing behavior, childhood trauma, and psychological health were assessed with questionnaires. Data were analyzed using Bayesian analyses, where Bayes factors (BF) of 3 or higher were considered as substantial evidence for the tested hypotheses.ResultsWe found that “Verdingkinder” offspring reported more physical abuse (BF10=5.197) and higher total childhood trauma exposure (BF10=2.476). They described both their fathers (BF10=14.246) and mothers (BF10=24.153) as less emotional and their mothers as more punitive (BF10=18.725). An increased sense of reflection, for instance, one's ability to take different perspectives, was found in the offspring controls (BF10=5.245). Furthermore, exploratory analyses revealed that lower perceived familial emotionality was associated with higher psychopathology (all BF10=10.471) and higher pessimism (all BF10=5.396).DiscussionOur data provide cross-sectional evidence of a meaningful transgenerational relationship between parental childhood adversity, dysfunctional rearing behavior, and psychological health of offspring. Prospective studies are needed to investigate these findings in a longitudinal setting.Highlights of the article The study showed elevated levels of aversive childhood events in the adult offspring of former indentured childhood laborers.The offspring of former indentured childhood laborers did not exhibit increased general psychopathology (as assessed by the Symptom-Checklist: SCL).However, the recalled childhood rearing behavior was more problematic (higher punishment, less emotional warmth) in the offspring of former indentured childhood laborers as compared to a 2nd generation control group.Second generation group differences for world view variables (optimism, pessimism) were not substantial or in favor of the control participants (reflection facet of sense of coherence-revised).

Adverse Childhood Experiences in Children with Intellectual Disabilities: An Exploratory Case-File Study in Dutch Residential Care

“…A considerable number of children had parents with ACEs (28.6%), which correlated positively with the total number of ACEs from the original ACEs framework in children and the presence of Parental substance abuse, Parental incarceration, the child being a Witness of violence against a parent and the child experiencing Physical abuse and Emotional neglect specifically. Because parental ACEs are assumed to have a transgenerational relationship with dysfunctional rearing behavior, parental coping problems and mental health problems in their children, including attachment problems [ 64 , 68 , 80 , 89 , 90 ], it is plausible that children of these parents are at higher risk for ACEs themselves.…”

“…Recent studies examined the impact of parental ACEs on children in the general population. Overall, parental ACEs seem to have a transgenerational relationship with developmental problems in their children [ 80 , 81 , 82 , 83 ]. More parental ACEs and less resilience have been found to be associated with parental coping difficulties [ 84 ].…”

“…Some studies have associated maternal life experiences and ACEs [ 81 , 85 , 86 , 87 , 88 ] and mental health [ 87 ] with the development and behavior of their children. Possibly, dysfunctional rearing behavior plays a mediating role in parental ACEs and children’s outcomes [ 80 ]. Impaired caregiving might play a role in the chronicity of the ACEs in children [ 68 ].…”

A decennial review of psychotraumatology: what did we learn and where are we going?

“…What we do not know is how the neurobiological (Lanius & Olff, 2017), psychological (Baekkelund, Frewen, Lanius, Ottesen Berg, & Arnevik, 2018;Schafer, Becker, King, Horsch, & Michael, 2019), affective (Strøm, Aakvaag, Birkeland, Felix, & Thoresen, 2018), and relational (Heeke, Kampisiou, Niemeyer, & Knaevelsrud, 2019;van Dijke, Hopman, & Ford, 2018) alterations associated with different forms, durations, and structures (Armour, Fried, & Olff, 2017;Murphy, Elklit, Dokkedahl, & Shevlin, 2018) of psychotrauma exposure (and reexposure) emerge and take different courses or trajectories across the lifespanand across generations (Burnette & Cannon, 2014;Crombach & Bambonye, 2015;Schick, Morina, Klaghofer, Schnyder, & Muller, 2013). Biopsychosocial mechanisms and processes involved in the long-term adverse impact of childhood trauma over decades into mid-life and old age (Glück, Knefel, Tran, & Lueger-Schuster, 2016) and across generations (Kuffer, Thoma, & Maercker, 2016) have been preliminarily conceptualized but remain understudied. We do not know how, for whom, and under what circumstances trajectories of post-traumatic resilience emerge across the lifespan, although we are beginning to understand that resilience is a complex and multifaceted phenomenon that warrants much further study (Iacoviello & Charney, 2014;Nugent, Sumner, & Amstadter, 2014;Sheerin, Stratton, Amstadter, & McDonald, 2018;Southwick, Bonanno, Masten, Panter-Brick, & Yehuda, 2014), particularly in order to inform enhancements of trauma-focused therapies based on promoting resilience (Schnyder, 2014).…”

Systematic search of Bayesian statistics in the field of psychotraumatology

“…Küffer, Thoma, and Maercker (2016) investigated early-life adversity experienced by parents that had an impact on their children’s mental health. The authors tested the null hypothesis using BFs in the software JASP (Marsman & Wagenmakers, 2016).…”