This article reports the results of a scoping review of the literature on life-course patterns of violence that span the developmental periods of childhood, adolescence, and early and middle ...adulthood. We also assess the evidence on elder mistreatment and its relation to earlier forms of violence. Additionally, we draw on theories and empirical studies to help explain the transmission of violence over time and relational contexts and the factors that appear to mitigate risks and promote resilience in individuals exposed to violence. Results suggest that encounters with violence beginning in childhood elevate the risk for violence in subsequent developmental periods. The strongest connections are between child maltreatment (physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and neglect) and violence in adolescence and between violence in adolescence and violence in early and middle adulthood. Persistence of violence into older adulthood leading to elder mistreatment is less well-documented, but probable, based on available research. We conclude that more attention should be paid to studying developmental patterns and intersecting forms of violence that extend into old age. To eradicate violence in all its forms, considerably more must be done to increase awareness of the repetition of violence; to connect research to actionable steps for prevention and intervention across the life course; and to better integrate systems that serve vulnerable children, youth, and adults. Primary prevention is essential to breaking the cycle of violence within families and to alleviating the risks to children caused by poverty and other external factors such as social disconnection within communities.
Abstract The aim of this study is to examine associations among childhood physical, emotional, or sexual abuse and violence toward self (suicide attempts SA) and others (interpersonal aggression IA). ...Data were obtained from the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions Waves 1 and 2 ( n = 34,653). Multinomial logistic regression examined associations between type of childhood abuse and violence categories, adjusting for demographic variables, other childhood adversity, and DSM-IV psychiatric disorders. The prevalence of reported childhood abuse was 4.60% for physical abuse, 7.83% for emotional abuse, and 10.20% for sexual abuse. Approximately 18% of adults reported some form of violent behavior, distributed as follows: IA, 13.37%; SA, 2.64%; and SA with IA, 1.85%. After adjusting for demographic variables, other childhood adversity, and psychiatric disorders, each type of childhood abuse was significantly related to increased risk for each violence category as compared with the no violence category. Furthermore, the odds ratio of childhood physical abuse was significantly higher for SA with IA when compared with IA, and the odds ratio of childhood sexual abuse was significantly higher for SA and SA with IA when compared with IA. Childhood physical, emotional, and sexual abuse is directly related to the risk for violent behaviors to self and others. Both internalizing and externalizing psychiatric disorders impact the association between childhood abuse and violence. The inclusion of suicidal behaviors and interpersonal aggression and internalizing/externalizing psychiatric disorders within an integrated conceptual framework will facilitate more effective interventions for long-lasting effects of child abuse.
The Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse is the largest royal commission in Australia’s history and one of the largest public inquiries into institutional child abuse ...internationally. With an investment from the Australian government of half a billion dollars, it examined how institutions with a responsibility for children, both historically and in the present, have responded to allegations of child sexual abuse. Announced in the wake of previous Australian and international inquiries, public scandals and lobbying by survivor groups, its establishment reflected increasing recognition of the often lifelong and intergenerational damage caused by childhood sexual abuse and a strong political commitment to improving child safety and wellbeing in Australia. This article outlines the background, key features and innovations of this landmark public inquiry, focusing in particular on its extensive research program. It considers its international significance and also serves as an introduction to this special edition on the Australian Royal Commission, exploring its implications for better understanding institutional child sexual abuse and its impacts, and for making institutions safer places for children in the future.
Reassesses thirty years of domestic violence research and demonstrates three forms of partner violence, distinctive in their origins, effects, and treatments
Domestic violence, a serious and ...far-reaching social problem, has generated two key debates among researchers. The first debate is about gender and domestic violence. Some scholars argue that domestic violence is primarily male-perpetrated, others that women are as violent as men in intimate relationships. Johnson’s response to this debate—and the central theme of this book—is that there is more than one type of intimate partner violence. Some studies address the type of violence that is perpetrated primarily by men, while others are getting at the kind of violence that women areinvolved in as well. Because there has been no theoretical framework delineating types of domestic violence, researchers have easily misread one another’s studies.
The second major debate involves how many women are abused each year by their partners. Estimates range from two to six million. Johnson’s response once again comes from this book’s central theme. If there is more than one type of intimate partner violence, then the numbers depend on what type you’re talking about.
Johnson argues that domestic violence is not a unitary phenomenon. Instead, he delineates three major, dramatically different, forms of partner violence: intimate terrorism, violent resistance, and situational couple violence. He roots the conceptual distinctions among the forms of violence in an analysis of the role of power and control in relationship violence and shows that the failure to make these basic distinctions among types of partner violence has produced a research literature that is plagued by both overgeneralizations and ostensibly contradictory findings. This volume begins the work of theorizing forms of domestic violence, a crucial first step to a better understanding of these phenomena among scholars, social scientists, policy makers, and service providers.
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are associated with several adulthood health problems, such as self-directed violence. For some individuals, enlistment in the military may be an instrumental act ...to escape adverse household environments; however, to our knowledge prevalence of ACEs among persons with a history of military service has not been documented in the United States using population-based data.
To compare the prevalence of ACEs among individuals with and without a history of military service.
Data are from the 2010 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. Computer-assisted telephone interviews were conducted with population-based samples of noninstitutionalized US adults from January 1 through December 31, 2010. Analyses were limited to respondents who received the ACE module (n = 60,598). Participants were categorized by history of military service and whether a respondent was 18 years of age in 1973.
History of military service was defined by active duty service, veteran status, or training for the Reserves or National Guard. The ACE inventory assessed 11 negative experiences before the age of 18 years. Weighted χ2 tests and multiple logistic regression analyses were used to examine differences in ACEs by history of military service, era of service, and sex.
Those with military experience had greater odds of any difference in prevalence of ACEs. In the all-volunteer era, men with military service had a higher prevalence of ACEs in all 11 categories than men without military service. Notably, in the all-volunteer era, men with military service had twice the odds of reporting forced sex before the age of 18 years (odds ratio, 2.19; 95% CI, 1.34-3.57) compared with men without military service. In the draft era, the only difference among men was household drug use, in which men with a history of military service had a significantly lower prevalence than men without a history of military service (2.1% vs. 3.3%; P = .003). Fewer differences were observed among women in the all-volunteer and draft eras.
Differences in ACEs by era and sex lend preliminary support that enlistment may serve as an escape from adversity for some individuals, at least among men. Further research is needed to understand how best to support service members and veterans who may have experienced ACEs.
The aim of the systematic review described in this article was to synthesize available high-quality evidence on the outcomes of noninstitutional child maltreatment across the life span. A systematic ...review of previous systematic reviews and meta-analyses was conducted. Ten databases were searched. One hundred eleven papers which met stringent inclusion and exclusion criteria were selected for review. Papers were included if they reported systematic reviews and meta-analyses of longitudinal or cross-sectional controlled studies, or single-group cohort primary studies of the outcomes of child maltreatment in the domains of physical and mental health and psychosocial adjustment of individuals who were children lived mainly with their families. Using AMSTAR criteria, selected systematic reviews and meta-analyses were found to be of moderate or high quality. Searches, study selection, data extraction, and study quality assessments were independently conducted by two researchers, with a high degree of interrater reliability. The 111 systematic reviews and meta-analyses reviewed in this article covered 2,534 independent primary studies involving 30,375,962 participants, of whom more than 518,022 had been maltreated. The magnitude and quality of this evidence base allow considerable confidence to be placed in obtained results. Significant associations were found between a history of child maltreatment and adjustment in the domains of physical health, mental health, and psychosocial adjustment in a very wide range of areas. The many adverse outcomes associated with child maltreatment documented in this review highlight the importance of implementing evidence-based child protection policies and practices to prevent maltreatment and treat child abuse survivors.
Although people with a history of child abuse are known to be at elevated risk for later difficulties in relationships, there is debate over whether these effects are enduring and relatively ...immutable or are moderated by characteristics and behaviors of the partner. To reconcile these competing perspectives, we conducted a longitudinal study of 414 newlywed couples living in low-income neighborhoods, testing whether the association between abuse history and relationship satisfaction is dependent on the partners' aggression, depression, substance abuse, observed communication, and other demographic risk factors. Spouses who had been abused as children (25% of husbands, 31% of wives) reported more symptoms of depression and substance abuse and, among husbands, displayed more negative communication. Spouses with a history of child abuse were also less satisfied with their marriage, even as newlyweds; abused wives also declined in satisfaction over time compared to those without this history. However, interactions between abuse history and all of the proposed moderators were not significant, indicating that partner and relationship characteristics failed to strengthen or weaken the association between abuse history and relationship satisfaction. Childhood experiences of abuse appear to have lasting and broad effects on individual and relational outcomes, and these effects are neither heightened nor mitigated by the partner's characteristics or behaviors.
Background: Child maltreatment has been associated with substance use later in life, but few studies have used repeated measures. Objective: To assess the association between child maltreatment and ...use of psychoactive substances from adolescence to early adulthood, and whether this differs by sex. Participants and setting: 3641 participants from the 1993 Pelotas Birth Cohort, Brazil. Methods: Child maltreatment (psychological, physical and sexual abuse, and physical neglect) was assessed up to age 15 and use of psychoactive substances (smoking, harmful use of alcohol and use of illicit drugs) was assessed at ages 15, 18, and 22 years. Associations between child maltreatment and use of substances at each time point were analyzed using logistic regression, adjusted for confounders. Results: Overall, child maltreatment was associated with substance use, and the strength of the associations decreased over time. E.g., the association between psychological abuse and harmful use of alcohol was OR 2.17 (95%CI 1.80, 2.62; p-value < 0.001) at 15 years, OR 1.61 (95%CI 1.31, 1.97; p-value < 0.001) at 18 years, and OR1.55 (95%CI 1.22, 1.96; p-value < 0.001) at 22 years. When sex differences were evident, stronger associations were observed among females. E.g., the association between physical abuse and smoking at 15 years was OR 3.49 (95%CI 2.17, 5.62) in females and OR 0.87 (95%CI 0.30, 2.52) in males (p-value for sex interaction = 0.041). Conclusions: Child maltreatment was associated with psychoactive substance in adolescence and early adulthood. Strategies to prevent use of substances could benefit those who suffered maltreatment in childhood.
Child maltreatment through physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, and exposure to domestic violence, causes substantial adverse health, educational and behavioural consequences ...through the lifespan. The generation of reliable data on the prevalence and characteristics of child maltreatment in nationwide populations is essential to plan and evaluate public health interventions to reduce maltreatment. Measurement of child maltreatment must overcome numerous methodological challenges. Little is known to date about the extent, nature and methodological quality of these national studies. This study aimed to systematically review the most comprehensive national studies of the prevalence of child maltreatment, and critically appraise their methodologies to help inform the design of future studies.
Guided by PRISMA and following a published protocol, we searched 22 databases from inception to 31 May 2019 to identify nationwide studies of the prevalence of either all five or at least four forms of child maltreatment. We conducted a formal quality assessment and critical analysis of study design.
This review identified 30 national prevalence studies of all five or at least four forms of child maltreatment, in 22 countries. While sound approaches are available for different settings, methodologies varied widely in nature and robustness. Some instruments are more reliable and obtain more detailed and useful information about the characteristics of the maltreatment, including its nature, frequency, and the relationship between the child and the person who inflicted the maltreatment. Almost all studies had limitations, especially in the level of detail captured about maltreatment, and the adequacy of constructs of maltreatment types.
Countries must invest in rigorous national studies of the prevalence of child maltreatment. Studies should use a sound instrument containing appropriate maltreatment constructs, and obtain nuanced information about its nature.
Several widely held beliefs about child abuse and neglect may be incorrect. It is most commonly assumed that some forms of abuse (eg, physical and sexual abuse) are more harmful than others (eg, ...emotional abuse and neglect); other assumptions are that each form of abuse has specific consequences and that the effects of abuse differ across sex and race.
To determine whether widely held assumptions about child abuse and neglect are valid by testing the hypothesis that different types of child maltreatment (CM) actually have equivalent, broad, and universal effects.
This observational study assessed 2292 racially and ethnically diverse boys (1254 54.7%) and girls (1038 45.3%) aged 5 to 13 years (mean SD age, 9.0 2.0 years) who attended a research summer camp program for low-income, school-aged children from July 1, 1986, to August 15, 2012. Of these children, 1193 (52.1%) had a well-documented history of maltreatment. Analysis was conducted from September 25, 2013, to June 1, 2015.
Various forms of internalizing and externalizing personality and psychopathologic traits were assessed using multiple informant ratings on the California Child Q-Set and Teacher Report Form as well as child self-reported depression and peer ratings of aggression and disruptive behavior.
Structural analysis showed that different forms of CM have equivalent psychiatric and behavioral effects, ranging from anxiety and depression to rule-breaking and aggression. We also found that nonsexual CM alters 2 broad vulnerability factors, internalizing (β = 0.185; SE = 0.028; P < .001) and externalizing (β = 0.283; SE = 0.023; P < .001), that underlie multiple forms of psychiatric and behavioral disturbance. We show that CM has comparable consequences for boys and girls of different races, and our results allowed us to describe a base rate and co-occurrence issue that makes it difficult to identify the unique effects of child sexual abuse.
Our findings challenge widely held beliefs about how child abuse should be recognized and treated-a responsibility that often lies with the physician. Because different types of child abuse have equivalent, broad, and universal effects, effective treatments for maltreatment of any sort are likely to have comprehensive psychological benefits. Population-level prevention and intervention strategies should emphasize emotional abuse, which occurs with high frequency but is less punishable than other types of child maltreatment.
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