Carrying the misery to adulthood: the impact of childhood sexual abuse on adulthood impulse control through depression and suicidal thoughts

ABSTRACT

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) has been linked to a wide range of negative outcomes, including the development of low impulse control in adulthood. Because previous studies have identified impulsivity as a robust predictor of antisocial and criminal behaviors, CSA may be an important early-in-life risk factor to consider. But the pathway between CSA and impulsivity is not well understood. Research suggests CSA is an important predictor of various forms of psychopathology, such as depression and suicidal thoughts. Pulling this all together, we investigated the possibility that CSA impacts depression and suicidal thoughts and that those experiences go on to affect the development and manifestation of impulse control in adulthood. We drew on a nationally representative sample of adolescents and adults (Add Health) to test the pathways by which CSA might affect impulse control. We found that CSA negatively influences impulse control, and that depression and suicidal thoughts may mediate this relationship. Our findings highlight the importance of trauma-oriented interventions for survivors of CSA – on top of their other benefits, such interventions may have an influence on the development of impulse control later in life.

KEYWORDS:

• Childhood sexual abuse
• impulse control
• psychopathology
• mediation

Data availability

This research uses data from Add Health, a program project directed by Kathleen Mullan Harris and designed by J. Richard Udry, Peter S. Bearman, and Kathleen Mullan Harris at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and funded by grant P01-HD31921 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, with cooperative funding from 23 other federal agencies and foundations. Special acknowledgment is due Ronald R. Rindfuss and Barbara Entwisle for assistance in the original design. Information on how to obtain the Add Health data files is available on the Add Health website (http://www.cpc.unc.edu/addhealth). No direct support was received from grant P01-HD31921 for this analysis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this project was provided by the College of Education, Criminal Justice, and Human Services Graduate Student and Faculty Research Mentoring Grant and the School of Criminal Justice Doctoral Research Grant at the University of Cincinnati.

Notes on contributors

Shahin Tasharrofi

Shahin Tasharrofi is a doctoral candidate in the School of Criminal Justice at the University of Cincinnati. His research seeks to identify how environmental factors affect criminological phenomena. His research interests include developmental criminology, correctional interventions, and criminal justice policies.

J.C. Barnes

J.C. Barnes is an associate professor in the School of Criminal Justice at the University of Cincinnati. His research seeks to identify how genetic and environmental factors combine to impact criminological phenomena. Recent works can be found in outlets such as Behavior Genetics, Criminology, Developmental Psychology, and Journal of Marriage and Family.