Child sexual abuse and subsequent psychopathology: results from the National Comorbidity Survey

There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between child sexual abuse (CSA) and subsequent onset of psychiatric disorders, accounting for other childhood adversities, CSA type, and chronicity of the abuse. Retrospective reports of CSA, other adversities, and psychiatric disorders were obtained by the National Comorbidity Survey, a nationally representative survey of the United States (n = 5877). Reports were analyzed by multivariate methods. CSA was reported by 13.5% of women and 2.5% of men. When other childhood adversities were controlled for, significant associations were found between CSA and subsequent onset of 14 mood, anxiety, and substance use disorders among women and 5 among men. In a subsample of respondents reporting no other adversities, odds of depression and substance problems associated with CSA were higher. Among women, rape (vs molestation), knowing the perpetrator (vs strangers), and chronicity of CSA (vs isolated incidents) were associated with higher odds of some disorders. CSA usually occurs as part of a larger syndrome of childhood adversities. Nonetheless, CSA, whether alone or in a larger adversity cluster, is associated with substantial increased risk of subsequent psychopathology.

Related collections

Most cited references 53

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Global mortality, disability, and the contribution of risk factors: Global Burden of Disease Study.

Christopher Murray, Alan Lopez (1997)

Prevention and control of disease and injury require information about the leading medical causes of illness and exposures or risk factors. The assessment of the public-health importance of these has been hampered by the lack of common methods to investigate the overall, worldwide burden. The Global Burden of Disease Study (GBD) provides a standardised approach to epidemiological assessment and uses a standard unit, the disability-adjusted life year (DALY), to aid comparisons. DALYs for each age-sex group in each GBD region for 107 disorders were calculated, based on the estimates of mortality by cause, incidence, average age of onset, duration, and disability severity. Estimates of the burden and prevalence of exposure in different regions of disorders attributable to malnutrition, poor water supply, sanitation and personal and domestic hygiene, unsafe sex, tobacco use, alcohol, occupation, hypertension, physical inactivity, use of illicit drugs, and air pollution were developed. Developed regions account for 11.6% of the worldwide burden from all causes of death and disability, and account for 90.2% of health expenditure worldwide. Communicable, maternal, perinatal, and nutritional disorders explain 43.9%; non-communicable causes 40.9%; injuries 15.1%; malignant neoplasms 5.1%; neuropsychiatric conditions 10.5%; and cardiovascular conditions 9.7% of DALYs worldwide. The ten leading specific causes of global DALYs are, in descending order, lower respiratory infections, diarrhoeal diseases, perinatal disorders, unipolar major depression, ischaemic heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, tuberculosis, measles, road-traffic accidents, and congenital anomalies. 15.9% of DALYs worldwide are attributable to childhood malnutrition and 6.8% to poor water, and sanitation and personal and domestic hygiene. The three leading contributors to the burden of disease are communicable and perinatal disorders affecting children. The substantial burdens of neuropsychiatric disorders and injuries are under-recognised. The epidemiological transition in terms of DALYs has progressed substantially in China, Latin America and the Caribbean, other Asia and islands, and the middle eastern crescent. If the burdens of disability and death are taken into account, our list differs substantially from other lists of the leading causes of death. DALYs provide a common metric to aid meaningful comparison of the burden of risk factors, diseases, and injuries.