Adverse childhood experiences: A health risk in emerging adulthood

Abstract

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) represent a child’s exposure to negative events that are detrimental to their mental and physical health. Despite this, very few studies have focused on the relationship between ACEs and physical health problems, in non-English-speaking populations and in emerging adulthood. Therefore, the objective of this study was to investigate the cumulative and differential impact of ACEs on diverse physical health problems in a Spanish population. Participants were 648 young adults (22% men), between the ages of 18 and 30 (mean age = 21.37, SD = 3.11), who completed the ACE Questionnaire and answered some questions about their health (e.g. asthma, obesity, global health). From the cumulative perspective, ACEs had a significant relationship with global health and asthma. Additionally, the differential approach revealed some specific ACEs related to three out of five health outcomes. Therefore, early detection of ACEs is of paramount importance to reduce their impact.