Childhood trauma, pubertal timing, and cardiovascular risk in adulthood

An association between childhood trauma and adult health outcomes has been widely reported, but little is known about the developmental pathways through which childhood trauma influences adult cardiovascular disease (CVD).

Hypotheses were tested with a sample of 405 African Americans from the Family and Community Health Study (FACHS). Path modeling was used to test our theoretical model.

Replicating prior research, exposure to childhood trauma was associated positively with increases in symptoms of CVD risk across young adulthood even after controlling for a variety of health-related and health behavior covariates. Further, the association of childhood trauma with CVD risk was mediated by early pubertal maturation. There were no gender differences in the magnitude of this effect.

Our findings support an evolutionary-development perspective (Belsky & Shalev, 2016) suggesting that early adverse life experiences lead to early biologically embedded changes reflected in early physical maturation and that these early changes predict later negative adult health outcomes. The results imply that early pubertal maturation is a precursor to vulnerability to long term health problems. From an intervention standpoint, identifying such developmental pathways may help inform future health-promoting interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record