Child abuse: physical and psychological consequences in children

A series of recent investigations reveal that neurobiological alterations as a consequence of child abuse, not only they increase the chance of developing mental disorders in adulthood but also increase the chances of future organic disorders, as well as behavioral disturbances.

Child abuse

Child abuse, domestic violence and childhood neglect are possible traumatic events for any child, and are much more frequent than you thinkto. According to him Center for Child Mental Health, University College London, each year between 4 and 16 per cent of children in industrialized western countries suffer physical abuse and 1 in 10 suffer from neglect or extreme mental overload.

Regarding the childhood sexual abuse, between 5 and 10 percent of girls and 5 percent of boys have suffered it at some time throughout his childhood.

Adverse experiences during childhood

I have divided the following study into different phases, since despite the fact that it began during a period 1995-1997, data analyzes have lasted for several years, obtaining a large number of results.

Phase 1 - Start

The study is usually abbreviated asACE (for its acronym in English).

The investigation began in 1995 in San Diego, with the participation of 17,000 subjects who were subjected to regular check-ups. They also had to report in detail on what kind of traumatic experiences they may have suffered during the childhood (violence, abuse, abandonment) and to what extent.

Phase 2 - First results

In 1998, the researcher Vincent Felitti, who belonged to the preventive medicine department of the medical group Kaiser Permanente, reached the following conclusions when analyzing the data obtained by the ACE study together with his team.

According to a survey used During the study, subjects who answered affirmatively to more than three questions about child abuse and neglect during childhood had up to 12 times more chances to suffer alcoholism, drug addiction or develop a depression, compared to people who had not suffered these events (and therefore responded negatively to the survey).

Other striking results were the increase in: suffer from smoking and obesity; practice less sport and have sporadic sexual relations.

Phase 3 - Variables Analysis

Subsequent to previous results, in the year 2003 The researchers decided to check the results on the increase in the appearance of cardiovascular diseases coronary (as a consequence of abuse and abandonment) in the following way.

They analyzed how these types of diseases increased in three different ways:

• Taking all the variables, the possibility of suffering from coronary cardiovascular diseases is 3.6 times greater than in the population that does not have childhood trauma. These variables include individual characteristics (sex, age, physical activity and eating habits), psychological problems (depression and frustration) and, of course, if they have suffered some childhood trauma.

• Taking the groups of variables of psychological problems and childhood trauma, the possibility increased 3.1 times.

• Taking only the variables on childhood trauma, the possibility was 2.6 times higher.

That is, what increases the most the possibility of suffering from coronary cardiovascular problemss it is neither sex, nor if they suffer from depression, nor eating habits, nor physical activity, nor any of these variables, but the trauma in childhood.

Phase 4 - Latest results

Finally, in 2004, other subsequent evaluations of the same results revealed that those who had suffered this abuse during childhood and youth presented with greater frequency coronary heart disease, and more specifically: the more serious the childhood trauma, the greater the chances of suffering from diseases cardiovascular diseases, lung diseases, cancer, liver disease (blood-related diseases) and disorders autoimmune.

Brief biological explanation of the effects of child abuse

The childhood trauma they alter the biological mechanisms of the organism. Stress hormones and certain neurotransmitters play a role, leaving long-term imprints on the child's brain.

These alterations are especially evident in the communication between the hypothalamus, pituitary, and adrenal cortex.

• During a stressful situation, the hypothalamus secretes a hormone called corticotropin (CRH) that stimulates the pituitary.

• The pituitary gland then releases another hormone called adrenocorticotropic (ACTH).

• Finally, the adrenal cortex (located above the kidneys) receives ACTH, and this reacts by releasing cortisol (stress hormone).

Emotional abuse, neglect, and multiple sclerosis

A study carried out in the Hamburg Eppendorf University Clinic, headed by the researcher Carsten spitzer got the following surprising results.

He chose a total of 234 patients with multiple sclerosis and 885 healthy people. All of them had to report on their experiences during childhood. What was obtained was that both emotional abuse and abandonment were the twice as common among individuals with multiple sclerosis, compared to the healthy group.

A moral quartet, a Metabolic Syndrome and childhood Traumas

This syndrome consists of four factors:

1. Abdominal fat
2. Alterations in glucose metabolism
3. Alterations in blood lipids
4. Arterial hypertension

One of the keys to this syndrome is that the appearance of one of these factors, enhances the appearance of the others.

Well, various studies have confirmed that these 4 components belonging to the metabolic syndrome may appear as a result of traumatic experiences during childhood, of which, the most accused is the abdominal adiposity.

The latter has been corroborated by a study called NESDA (for its acronym in English) and carried out in the year 2012, in the Netherlands on depression and anxiety. In it they found a relationship between childhood sexual abuse and excess fat in the abdomen.

Child abuse and Psychosis in adulthood

First of all let's define what abuse is. According to World Health Organization:

“Child abuse is defined as the abuse and neglect of those under the age of 18, and includes all types of physical or psychological abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, neglect, and commercial or other exploitation that causes or may cause harm to the health, development or dignity of the child, or to endanger the survival of it, in the context of a relationship of responsibility, trust or can. Exposure to intimate partner violence is also sometimes included among the forms of child abuse ”.

Taking into account the neurological immaturity of the brain During the first years of life it is well known that it is more sensitive to events and experiences. This sensitivity gives the advantage of learning with great speed, but it can also carry great dangers:

Childhood abuse and psychotic symptoms

According to a study by the University of Barcelona analyzed the relationship between child abuse and the development of psychotic symptoms. The first thing they discovered was that even though I hadto people who, even having suffered child abuse, were able to overcome and lead a mentally healthy life.

Subsequently, the results pointed out that such individual differences reside in the factor gene neurotrophic (proteins that are responsible for the survival of neurons) derived from the brain known as BDNF. From the looks of it, this gene promotes the growth, differentiation of neurons and their survival during periods of stress.

In this study published in the journal The British Journal of Psychiatry, explains how exposure to severe child abuse (sexual, physical and / or emotional) is associated with a greater probability of suffering from psychotic symptoms in adult life. In addition, and this is where the BDNF gene comes into play, subjects with certain alleles for this gene were more vulnerable to this type of abuse, in comparison with those that presented another variable (the former had an allele called Met and the latter Val).

If you don't understand the latter very well, he thinks that for blood there are 3 alleles: A, B and O, and from the combination of these the different blood groups are obtained.

Genetic factors

There are a number of genes that increase the chances of suffering from long-term organic problems if you have suffered traumatic experiences.

According to some studies, one of these genes appears to be the FKBP5 gene. This gene, encoding a protein (along with others) affects the sensitivity of tissues and organs that react to cortisol (commonly known as the "stress hormone").

Given the results, it has been found that certain variants of FKBP5 raise the riskor depression (multiplying by 8 for one of these variants), and then post traumatic disorders, for those who suffered abuse in childhood.

In addition, these same data also suggest that some of the variants of this same gene are also related to organic disorders. But this is pending confirmation.

What is truly striking about this type of genes is the importance they can have for the appearance of various disorders, but only if there has been a environmental trigger, which in this case, is abuse in childhood. In other words, if a person has not experienced traumatic and stressful events during their childhood, having these genes will not increase the chances of suffering from these disorders.

Child abuse and its influence on epigenetic modifications

This is known as epigenetic modifications:

These modifications are appendages that adhere to DNA, influencing the frequency with which a certain gene is read. Namely, Although the genetic code of the person does not change, its functioning does.

I recommend this small documentary on the relatively novel field of epigenetics.

Bibliographic references:

• Burden and consequences of child maltreatment in high-income countries. R. Gilbert et al. in The Lancet, vol. 373, pp. 68-71, 2009.
• Moderation of adult depression by a polymorphism in the FKB5 gene and childhood physical abuse in the general population ”. K. Appel et al. in Neuropsychopharmacology, vol. 36, pp. 1982-1991, 2011.
• Childhood abuse and BDNF-Val66Met polymorphism: Evidence for gene-environment interaction of the development of adult psychosis-like experiences. S. Alemany et al. in The British Journal of Psychiatry, vol. 199, No. 1, pp. 38-42, 2011