Childhood adversities and adult psychopathology in the WHO World Mental Health Surveys

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Although significant associations of childhood adversities with adult mental disorders are widely documented, most studies focus on single childhood adversities predicting single disorders. AIMS: To examine joint associations of 12 childhood adversities with first onset of 20 DSM-IV disorders in World Mental Health (WMH) Surveys in 21 countries. METHOD: Nationally or regionally representative surveys of 51 945 adults assessed childhood adversities and lifetime DSM-IV disorders with the WHO Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI). RESULTS: Childhood adversities were highly prevalent and interrelated. Childhood adversities associated with maladaptive family functioning (e.g. parental mental illness, child abuse, neglect) were the strongest predictors of disorders. Co-occurring childhood adversities associated with maladaptive family functioning had significant subadditive predictive associations and little specificity across disorders. Childhood adversities account for 29.8% of all disorders across countries. CONCLUSIONS: Childhood adversities have strong associations with all classes of disorders at all life-course stages in all groups of WMH countries. Long-term associations imply the existence of as-yet undetermined mediators.

Cite this

Ronald C. Kessler, Katie A. McLaughlin, Jennifer Greif Green, Michael J. Gruber, Nancy A. Sampson, Alan M. Zaslavsky, … David R. Williams (2010). Childhood adversities and adult psychopathology in the WHO World Mental Health Surveys. The British Journal of Psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.bp.110.080499

@article{c2010childhood,
  title  = {Childhood adversities and adult psychopathology in the WHO World Mental Health Surveys},
  author = {Kessler, Ronald C. and McLaughlin, Katie A. and Green, Jennifer Greif and Gruber, Michael J. and Sampson, Nancy A. and Zaslavsky, Alan M. and Aguilar‐Gaxiola, Sergio and Al-Hamzawi, Ali A. and Alonso, Jordi and Angermeyer, Matthias C. and Benjet, Corina L. and Bromet, Evelyn J. and Chatterji, Somnath and Girolamo, Giovanni de and Demyttenaere, Koen and Fayyad, John A. and Florescu, Silvia and Gal, Gilad and Gureje, Oye and Haro, Josep Maria and Hu, Chiyi and Karam, Elie Georges and Kawakami, Norito and Lee, Sing and Lépine, Jean‐Pierre and Ormel, Johan and Posada‐Villa, José and Sagar, Rajesh and Tsang, Adley and Üstün, T. B. and Vassilev, Svetlozar and Viana, María Carmen and Williams, David R.},
  year   = {2010},
  journal = {The British Journal of Psychiatry},
  doi    = {10.1192/bjp.bp.110.080499}
}

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