Grant: Canada Postdoctoral Research Award (CPRA) program

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are negative life experiences (e.g., parental substance abuse, childhood maltreatment) that occur between birth and 17 years of age and are a globally recognized public health problem. Largely unexamined is how other modifiable exposures of everyday negative family dynamics, such as poor family functioning (e.g., a family's inability to function cohesively in daily tasks like problem-solving) and negative parenting practices (e.g., yelling, ignoring the child), may worsen the adverse impacts of ACEs on child and youth mental health (before age 25), and the mechanisms by which they transmit their negative mental health effects. To address key knowledge gaps, this research program will use epidemiologic methods to (1) estimate the interaction of ACEs and everyday negative family dynamics on the risk of mental disorder (e.g., anxiety disorder, eating disorder, self-harm) in children and youth, (2) test whether ACEs and everyday negative family dynamics may be disproportionately experienced by members of historically and contemporarily disadvantaged social positions (e.g., sexual and gender minorities), and (3) identify the mechanisms (e.g., early emotional and behavioural concerns, positive or negative coping resources) that lead to or prevent the onset of mental disorder in children and youth exposed to ACEs and negative family dynamics. Delineating how chronic, relational stressors of negative family dynamics may worsen the adverse effects of ACEs and their potential mechanisms is essential for identifying children and youth most at-risk for mental disorders, for designing interventions to mitigate symptoms of mental illness, and to inform (upstream) mental health promotion initiatives. This research program will identify children and youth most at-risk of mental disorder to maximize the reach of public health resources and inform pragmatic, scalable interventions to disrupt intergenerational cycles of poor mental health.