ArticleChild and adolescent psychiatry and mental health2017
Child maltreatment in Germany: prevalence rates in the general population.
Article in Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 98 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
98 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 297 citations in OpenAlex.
- Measuring Violence Against Children: A COSMIN Systematic Review of the Psychometric and Administrative Properties of Adult Retrospective Self-report Instruments on Child Abuse and Neglect.Trauma, violence & abuse · 2024Pooled it
- Improving measurement of child abuse and neglect: A systematic review and analysis of national prevalence studies.PloS one · 2020Pooled it
- Unfinished business: A grounded theory analysis of change among individuals classified as numerical non-responders to psychodynamic psychotherapy for post-traumatic stress disorder related to childhood maltreatment.Psychology and psychotherapy · 2026Trial
- From childhood to adult trauma and negative birth experiences: distal and proximal factors associated with childbirth-related posttraumatic stress symptoms.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2026Article
- The mediating role of personality functioning impairment between childhood maltreatment and adult mental health problems.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2026Article
- Reducing Problematic Parenting Behaviors, Child Neglect, and Internalizing and Externalizing Problems in Multisystemic Therapy for Child Abuse and Neglect.Child maltreatment · 2026Article
- Associations between online child sexual solicitation and abuse and offline child maltreatment: A latent class analysis.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2026Article
- Associations between perpetrator characteristics of child maltreatment, age of onset, and physical and mental health.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2026Article
- Caregiver adverse childhood experiences and burden: associations with child welfare risk in a caregiver-child-sample.Frontiers in child and adolescent psychiatry · 2026Article
- The impact of types of childhood maltreatment on the severity of PTSD and comorbid personality disorder symptoms.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2025Article
- Childhood abuse and neglect and adult body attitude.European journal of psychotraumatology · 2025Article
- Childhood maltreatment and adult diseases in the general population: the mediating role of smoking and overweight in a time-sequence design.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Childhood trauma and mental health outcomes in Post-COVID Syndrome: Results from a cross-sectional study in Germany.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2025Article
- The Relationship Between Childhood Trauma and Interpersonal Relationship Dimensions in Individuals with Generalized Anxiety Disorder: The Mediating Role of Anger Rumination.Psychiatry and clinical psychopharmacology · 2025Article
- The Relevance of Hypersexuality and Impulsivity in Different Groups of Treatment-Seekers With and Without (Exclusive) Pedophilia.Sexual abuse : a journal of research and treatment · 2025Article
- Sexual Violence Against Children and Adolescents: A German Nationwide Representative Survey on Its Prevalence, Situational Context, and Consequences.Deutsches Arzteblatt international · 2025Article
- Prevalence and prevention of violence against children and adolescents in volunteer work: analysis of a sub-sample from a representative survey of Germany.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Article
- Sex-specific differences in the experience of adverse childhood experiences: transmission, protective, and risk factors from the perspectives of parents and their children-results of an 18-year German longitudinal study.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2025Article
- Legacy of the GDR: regional disparities in childhood maltreatment in post-unification Germany.Child and adolescent psychiatry and mental health · 2025Article
38 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundChild maltreatment and its consequences are considered a major public health problem. So far, there is only one study from Germany reporting prevalence rates on different types of maltreatment.
methodsA representative sample of the German general population was examined for experiences of child maltreatment using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) between September and November 2016. A total of 2510 (53.3% female) participants between 14 and 94 years (M = 48.8 years) were enrolled. Besides the CTQ, a range of sociodemographic information was collected. The interrelatedness of different types of maltreatment was examined using configuration analysis and predictors for maltreatment were identified by performing binary logistic regression analyses.
resultsOverall, 2.6% (f: 3.9%, m: 1.2%) of all participants reported severe emotional abuse, 3.3% (f: 3.4%, m: 3.3%) severe physical abuse, 2.3% (f: 3.7%, m: 0.7%) severe sexual abuse, 7.1% (f: 8.1%, m: 5.9%) severe emotional neglect and 9% (f: 9.2%, m: 8.9%) severe physical neglect. Women were more likely to report at least moderate sexual and emotional abuse than men. The largest difference between age groups was reported for physical neglect, with participants aged over 70 years reporting the highest rates. Participants who reported childhood maltreatment were more likely to be unemployed or have lower educational outcomes. The most common combination of maltreatment types were physical and emotional neglect, all five types of maltreatment combined and physical and emotional neglect and physical abuse combined.
conclusionsChild maltreatment, especially physical neglect is common in the German population. Women seem to be at greater risk for sexual and emotional abuse than men. Knowledge about different types of maltreatment based on the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) can help to put findings of future studies into an epidemiological and societal context.
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