Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are potentially traumatic events that occur in childhood, from 0 to 17 years old. These experiences include various forms of abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction, such as witnessing violence, having a family member attempt or die by suicide, or growing up in a household with substance abuse.
The Consequences of ACEs
ACEs can have a profound impact on a person's overall health, leading to mental and chronic health conditions, and can affect individuals into adulthood. The more Adverse Childhood Experiences a person experiences as a child, the more likely they will suffer from poor health outcomes as an adult.
Toxic Stress as Trauma
Persistent fear and anxiety can affect young children's learning and development and change brain architecture.
Scientists now know that chronic, unrelenting stress in early childhood—caused, for example, by abrupt separation from caregivers, extreme poverty, or parental depression—can be toxic to the developing brain in the same way that repeated abuse and witnessing violence changes brain architecture.
Ten Categories of ACEs
Ten categories of childhood trauma, or ACEs, were identified in a research study conducted by Kaiser Permanente, a managed care consortium, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a federal agency of the US Dept. of Health and Human Services.
- Physical abuse
- Sexual abuse
- Emotional abuse
- Physical neglect
- Emotional neglect
- Mother treated violently
- Household substance abuse
- Household mental illness
- Parental separation or divorce
- Parental incarceration