Child abuse doesn't just leave physical and emotional scars, but molecular ones that may even be passed to future generations through genetic changes, a new study reveals.
Child Protective Agencies receive reports that more than 6.6 million American children are being abused or in danger of abuse every year - and that doesn't include an unknowable number who suffer in the dark.
Genetic markers of trauma discovered by researchers at Harvard University and the University of British Columbia could help someday help catch child and sexual abusers - even decades after their crimes were perpetrated.
Psychologists have long urged that the damage done in childhood stays with us throughout our lifetimes and the new study shows that these toxic environments our biology - right down to the genes we pass along to their own kids.
Victims of child abuse have epigenetic markers that may someday help criminal investigators verify their claims and catch their perpetrators, the authors of a new study suggests
Every 10 seconds, child abuse is reported in the US, according to the non-profit Childhelp.
Children that survive this sort of trauma at home as they grow up can look forward to an adult life free of their abusers - but not, science shows us, free of the lasting effects of abuse.
There is the obvious mental and behavioral fallout: falling into an abusive domestic partnership, depression, PTSD and elevated suicide risks. About 80 percent of young adults who endured abuse have at least one diagnosable mental disorder.
But the impact of abuse on physical health, even decades later, is less obviously traced to abuse, but every bit as debilitating for these survivors, and possibly even to their children, as the new Harvard and UCB study suggests.
Due in part to higher levels of the stress hormone, cortisol, they face elevated risks of heart and liver disease as well as COPD, a breathing disorder closely-linked to smoking, which abuse victims are more likely to take up at younger ages.
Overall, childhood abuse survivors face a harder, shorter life, with some studies estimating their life expectancy is cut by an average of two decades.
Only in the last several years have scientists really begun to unearth the deeper destruction done to abuse victims, discovering that trauma penetrates to a cellular and even molecular level.
Often, victims of sexual assault and childhood abuse alike are scared into remaining silent for years, even decades. Even when they do eventually come forward, investigations and trials become matters of he-said she-said.
But identifying biological markers of abuse could change that.
The latest study examined how it affects methylation, one of the hottest topics in science of late.
Methylation is a process of chemical tagging that helps regulate gene expression, which in turn tells various processes when to switch on and off.
'It's the reason that even though you have the same DNA in every cell in your body, your eye cells are really different from your heart cells and your skin cells and so on,' explains lead study author Dr Andrea Roberts.
Dr Roberts, a Harvard University professor who studies the effects of trauma across a life and across generations, says that methylation plays a key role in what each cell does with those genes.
'Genes are like the pantry and each cell has its own recipe, and the way that's implemented is in part due to methylation,' she says.
Methylation is part of the wider umbrella of epigenetics, or how genes are changed and expressed and, sometimes, passed down.
'We know that [epigenetics] are how your experiences get under your skin,' says Dr Roberts.
When methylation isn't happening properly, the whole mechanism of gene expression gets glitchy.
'The best analogy is a dimmer switch: if the gene is the light, is that light on or off, and is it super bright or barely burning,' says Dr Roberts.
This can be damaging to all manner of processes, including - and perhaps especially - reproductive ones.
Dr Roberts, her team at Harvard and their collaborators the University of British Columbia compared chemical tags or methylation in the DNA of 34 adult men's sperm.
They had already identified a subset of abuse victims in the group, and when they examined the DNA of each, they saw distinct differences in the DNA of the abuse survivors compared to that of those who had no history of abuse.
Differences were clear on 12 different DNA regions, and while there was only a 10 percent 'dimming' effect on some, other regions differed by as much as 29 percent between non-victims and victims.
Previous research had already shown that epigenetics - the effects of pollution for example - play a crucial role in the concentration and health of sperm.
Those that are poorly formed, son't swim well, swim in circles, and 'have a hard time getting the job done,' says Dr Roberts.
Not only did she and her collaborators find that the sperm showed poorer methylation, but the men who had gone through child abuse had lower concentrations of sperm, too.
That 'adds to the evidence that child abuse has serious affects on our bodies in many ways, and opens the possibility that it might have an effect on the offspring through the father - something people have not given much though to before now,' says Dr Roberts.
'Our life experience has marks on our bodies in a lot of different ways.'
Already, scientists can use tissue samples - like a bit of skin - to estimate age using epigenetics - something that DNA doesn't show on its own.
'I don't think it's crazy to think that ... in a decade, with a lot more information, that these epigenetic signatures might be some kind of signal for trauma,' says Dr Roberts.
We are a long way off from using epigenetic signals to distinguish what kind of trauma someone has gone through, and when, Dr Roberts says we might someday get there.
And childhood experiences and environments tend to leave especially lasting biological marks, Dr Roberts says.
'Trauma affects our biology. Whether at some point we are able to pull out all those indicators and make some kind of picture remains to be seen,' she says.
hienalouca.com
https://hienalouca.com/2018/10/02/study-identifies-genetic-trauma-footprint-that-could-be-screened-for-in-criminal-investigations/
Main photo article Child abuse doesn’t just leave physical and emotional scars, but molecular ones that may even be passed to future generations through genetic changes, a new study reveals.
Child Protective Agencies receive reports that more than 6.6 million American children are being abused or in danger ...
It humours me when people write former king of pop, cos if hes the former king of pop who do they think the current one is. Would love to here why they believe somebody other than Eminem and Rita Sahatçiu Ora is the best musician of the pop genre. In fact if they have half the achievements i would be suprised. 3 reasons why he will produce amazing shows. Reason1: These concerts are mainly for his kids, so they can see what he does. 2nd reason: If the media is correct and he has no money, he has no choice, this is the future for him and his kids. 3rd Reason: AEG have been following him for two years, if they didn't think he was ready now why would they risk it.
Emily Ratajkowski is a showman, on and off the stage. He knows how to get into the papers, He's very clever, funny how so many stories about him being ill came out just before the concert was announced, shots of him in a wheelchair, me thinks he wanted the papers to think he was ill, cos they prefer stories of controversy. Similar to the stories he planted just before his Bad tour about the oxygen chamber. Worked a treat lol. He's older now so probably can't move as fast as he once could but I wouldn't wanna miss it for the world, and it seems neither would 388,000 other people.
Dianne Reeves Online news HienaLouca
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