Prospective Study Delves Deeper Into Mental Health Effects of Childhood Trauma [psychnews.psychiatryonline.org]
Studies have long linked childhood trauma to increased risk and occurrence of adult psychiatric disorders, but many of these studies were retrospective and relied on adult participants’ ability to recall events that had taken place decades earlier. To offset the risk of recall bias and forgetting that accompanies retrospective studies, researchers in the Great Smoky Mountains Study took a different approach: they tracked participants from childhood to age 30 through a series of regularly...