A new study done by the University of California claims that parents who faced severe trauma or went through extremely stressful periods as children are more likely to have children who grow up to have behavioral problems. The research team reports that children who had experienced hardships like divorce or separation of their parents, death of a parent, or estrangement from a parent, or sexual, emotional or physical abuse went on to have kids who were more susceptible to the risk of developing behavioral problems. The team also noted that witnessing domestic violence, exposure to substance abuse by addicted parents, or having a mentally-ill parent also counted as a hardship.
Dr. Adam Schickedanz, who is the lead author of the study and also a pediatrician and health services researcher and assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA said, “Previous research has looked at childhood trauma as a risk factor for later physical and mental health problems in adulthood, but this is the first research to show that the long-term behavioral health harms of childhood adversity extend across generations from parent to child.”
The study also claimed that children of parents who went through a difficult childhood themselves were at a double risk of having or developing attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and quadrupled risk of having or developing a mental health disorder. As for which parent’s experiences affected the child more, the research team said that although both the parents’ experiences matter but the mother’s childhood experience had a stronger, detrimental effect on the child.
According to the research team, parents who lived through a tough childhood were more at a risk to have high levels of aggravation and developing mental health disorders. Researchers are aware that the mental health and attitude factors analysed in the study succeed only at explaining about a quarter of the association to the risk of developing behavioral problems of their children. How the early year experiences of the parents are transferred to the children and seen in their behaviour is something that should be further studied.
The findings support the already existing evidences of various standardized assessments of parents about their childhood experiences during the pediatric examinations of their children.
“If we can identify these children who are at a higher risk, we can connect them to services that might reduce their risk or prevent behavioral health problems”, explained Schikedanz.
For the study, scientists utilized the information from a national survey which had information from four generations of several american families- which included also included the information about whether or not the parents were abused, neglected or exposed to negative treatment while they were going up. It also included information about the the children’s behavioral problems and the medical assessments of their ADHD.
According to Schickednaz, the next step in the research will be studying resilience factors such as the support of mentors, or teachers could have helped reduce the negative impact of a traumatic childhood. The study was published recently in the journal Pediatrics.