In 2013, over 40% of all children in the United States experienced a physical assault and nearly 11% of all girls aged 14 to 17 experienced a sexual assault (Finkelhor et al., 2013).
Although childhood trauma is tragic whenever it occurs, many people find it to be even more upsetting when it happens to very young children. Unfortunately, this is all too common. A relatively recent study found that not only is trauma exposure common in preschool-aged children, but that they show similar prevalence trends as older youth. Furthermore, young children are equally likely to develop PTSD following trauma exposure (Woolgar et al., 2022).
We completed a brief analysis to examine the trauma exposure of the children we serve here at STL CAC. The graph below shows the percent of all surveyed children (N=906) who have experienced any type of trauma and at what age. As expected, the slope of the graph mirrors the demographics we serve (i.e. a majority in the 5-11 range). And as a brief aside, it’s notable that they have experienced an average of nearly seven types of traumas throughout their lifetimes. However, relevant to the topic at hand, between birth and five years of age, there is a steady increase from about 30% to over 90% of children having experienced a trauma. This is a strong indication we are seeing children who, at a very early age, have experienced traumatic events. And it is because of this that we’re so grateful that we have clinicians trained in the Child and Family Traumatic Stress Intervention for Young Children.
References
Finkelhor D, Turner HA, Shattuck A, Hamby SL. Violence, Crime, and Abuse Exposure in a National Sample of Children and Youth: An Update. JAMA Pediatr. 2013;167(7):614–621. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2013.42
Woolgar F, Garfield H, Dalgleish T, Meiser-Stedman R. Systematic Review and Meta-analysis: Prevalence of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Trauma-Exposed Preschool-Aged Children. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2022 Mar;61(3):366-377. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2021.05.026. Epub 2021 Jul 6. PMID: 34242737; PMCID: PMC8885427.