Measuring adverse childhood experiences by interviewing children at 9 and 10 years of age: Prevalence, concordance with mother-reports, posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, and subjective experience of being asked about adverse childhood experiences in FinnBrain Birth cohort study

Abstract

How children experience the screening of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) is little studied. Moreover, the similarity between parental and child reports is unknown. We interviewed 9-year-olds (a subsample of the FinnBrain Birth Cohort Study; N = 344) by using the Pediatric ACEs and Related Life Events Screener questionnaire (PEARLS; covering 10 traditional ACEs and 7 expanded items). Furthermore, we asked about the subjective harm caused by ACEs, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, and how the children experienced the interview. The mothers (N = 348) filled out the PEARLS youth questionnaire that provided a parental report on ACEs. In total, 39.2% of children self-reported zero ACEs, and the corresponding percentage for mother-reports was 30.2%. In addition, 7.8% of children reported having been exposed to ≥ 4 (of 17 possible) ACEs, which is an often-used cutoff score for adverse health outcomes. The corresponding percentage for mother-reports was higher at 14.7%. There was low concordance between mother- and child reports in cases where ACEs did happen 4.9% of children with at least 1 ACE reported PTSD symptoms. In general, 1.7% of children felt that it was difficult to answer the questions, whereas 78.6% felt that it was easy. Negative feelings (e.g., anxiety, depression) related to the interview were reported by 0.9% to 1.4% of the children. In addition, 2% reported only negative feelings, whereas 80% reported only positive feelings. The prevalence of ACEs at 9 and 10 years of age in the FinnBrain Birth Cohort was comparable to that in many retrospective adult studies in European general populations. The prevalence of PTSD symptoms was low and was not clearly linked to the number of self-reported ACEs. The observation that most children found the interview to be easy, neutral, or positive is encouraging, whereas the uneasiness of few children at the interview needs to be acknowledged.