What Are Adverse Childhood Experiences?

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The majority of parents with a history of childhood maltreatment do not become child abusers.

A child abuse history is the single biggest risk factor for maltreating one's children.

Maternal depression, dissociation, and substance abuse further increase risk for offspring maltreatment.

Interventions focused on intergenerational risk factors offer opportunities to end family cycles of violence.

This is the first post in a series.

Whenever I (Frank W. Putnam) present research on the intergenerational transmission of risk for the maltreatment of offspring, I start by emphasizing that the majority of parents who were abused or neglected as children do not become abusive parents.

Given the topics of my presentations and podcasts, it is likely that a substantial percentage of the audience will have a childhood maltreatment history or know someone close to them who does. Many parents who were abused as children worry that they may become abusers themselves. In general, those parents who worry about this possibility are highly unlikely to become child abusers, because one of the best ways to break the family cycle of violence is to acknowledge and deal with this personal history.

The recognition and emotional processing of such powerful personal experiences do not necessarily require a therapist (although one can be very helpful). One study found, for example, that telling a good friend, spouse, or significant other was associated with demographically high-risk maltreated mothers not having their children abused either by themselves or by abusive partners (Egeland & Susman-Stillman, 1996).

Some Parents With a Maltreatment History Do Become Child Abusers

Nonetheless, many studies find that a parental history of childhood maltreatment is the single strongest risk factor for child maltreatment of one’s offspring. For example, in a well-controlled, prospective study, the children of abused parents had a 6- to 12-fold increased risk of being abused compared to........

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