The report also points out
the prevalence of ACEs among black and Hispanic children.
In that study, the Office of Early Childhood Mental Health Unit and the University of Denver, with support from the Ben and Lucy Ana Walton Fund of the Walton Family Foundation, partnered to look at
the prevalence of ACEs in Colorado, and the impact of ACEs on the physical and mental health of adults and their children.
This issue brief builds on the fact sheet below, and includes national and state - level data on
the prevalence of ACEs as well as health effects and protective factors that mitigate the effects of trauma.
Utilizing the U.S. 2011 — 2012 National Survey of Children's Health, this study examines both
the prevalence of ACEs in a nationally representative sample of 12 — 17 year old adolescents and the cross-sectional relationship between experiencing ACEs and multiple measures of well - being.
In this paper, the literature on childhood trauma is explored, focusing on
the prevalence of ACEs and the extent to which they have been found to negatively affect physical health and social outcomes.
It also points to the greater
prevalence of ACEs among looked after children and indicates that this is also the case with previously looked after children.
During the all - volunteer - era, men with military service had a higher
prevalence of ACEs in all 11 categories than men without military service.
Authors compared
the prevalence of ACEs among individuals with and without a history of military service using data from a behavioral risk surveillance system, along with telephone interviews, for an analytic sample of more than 60,000 people.
We used Levin's formula for these calculations: ARF = P1 (RR − 1) / 1 + P1 (RR − 1), 36 where P1 is
the prevalence of an ACE score of at least 1 and RR is the OR of attempted suicide for an ACE score of at least 1.36 The ARF is an estimate of the proportion of the health problem (eg, attempted suicide) that would not have occurred if no persons had been exposed to the risk factor being assessed.36
Not exact matches
Parental divorce and economic hardship were the most prevalent
ACEs for both groups; Children in immigrant families reported a
prevalence of 11.9 percent for parental divorce and 32.1 percent for economic hardship, while children in U.S. - native families reported a
prevalence of 25.5 percent for parental divorce and 29.9 percent for economic hardship.
Men and women who have served in the military have a higher
prevalence of adverse childhood events (
ACEs), suggesting that enlistment may be a way to escape adversity for some.
Understand the
prevalence and impact
of ACEs on health across a lifetime.
The
prevalence and likelihood
of having IHD significantly increased among persons exposed to any individual
ACE (Table 2) except parental marital discord.
Because the risks for attempted suicide increased substantially beginning with an
ACE score
of 1, we used an
ACE score
of at least 1 (
prevalence = 64 %) to calculate ARFs.
The
prevalence of each experience and
of the
ACE scores is shown in Table 1.
Felitti and colleagues1 first described
ACEs and defined it as exposure to psychological, physical or sexual abuse, and household dysfunction including substance abuse (problem drinking / alcoholic and / or street drugs), mental illness, a mother treated violently and criminal behaviour in the household.1 Along with the initial
ACE study, other studies have characterised
ACEs as neglect, parental separation, loss
of family members or friends, long - term financial adversity and witness to violence.2 3 From the original cohort
of 9508 American adults, more than half
of respondents (52 %) experienced at least one adverse childhood event.1 Since the original cohort,
ACE exposures have been investigated globally revealing comparable
prevalence to the original cohort.4 5 More recently in 2014, a survey
of 4000 American children found that 60.8 %
of children had at least one form
of direct experience
of violence, crime or abuse.6 The
ACE study precipitated interest in the health conditions
of adults maltreated as children as it revealed links to chronic diseases such as obesity, autoimmune diseases, heart, lung and liver diseases, and cancer in adulthood.1 Since then, further evidence has revealed relationships between
ACEs and physical and mental health outcomes, such as increased risk
of substance abuse, suicide and premature mortality.4 7
To better address these issues, we analyzed data from 4127 men who provided reproductive histories and information about childhood exposure to abuse as part
of the Adverse Childhood Experiences (
ACE) Study.15 Because
of the considerable
prevalence of adult male involvement in teen pregnancy, we included males who were > 19 years old when they impregnated a teenage girl.
ACEs are strongly related to the development and
prevalence of a wide range
of health problems throughout a person's lifespan, including those associated with substance misuse.
Prevalence and Adjusted OR *
of Initiation
of Illicit Drugs During Early Adolescence (≤ 14 Years) and Lifetime Use
of Illicit Drugs by Category
of ACE
Click here to learn more about the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study (
ACES) and the
prevalence of childhood trauma.
October 6, 2017: As a part
of the Sesame Workshop's «Sesame Street in Communities» initiative on helping children cope with traumatic experiences, the CAHMI has developed a fact sheet on the
prevalence of Adverse Childhood Experiences (
ACEs) among US children and youth, using newly released data from the 2016 National Survey
of Children's Health.
In the UK, a national household survey found that the
prevalence of at least one
ACE was 46.4 % and 8.3 % had experienced four or more
ACEs (Bellis et al., 2014).