ArticleClinical epigenetics2020
Adverse childhood experiences, DNA methylation age acceleration, and cortisol in UK children: a prospective population-based cohort study.
Article in Clinical epigenetics, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 42 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
42 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 65 citations in OpenAlex.
- The impact of adverse childhood experiences on DNA methylation age: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Clinical epigenetics · 2026Pooled it
- Using Epigenetic Clocks to Characterize Biological Aging in Studies of Children and Childhood Exposures: a Systematic Review.Prevention science : the official journal of the Society for Prevention Research · 2023Pooled it
- Epigenetic impact of a 1-week intensive multimodal group program for adolescents with multiple adverse childhood experiences.Scientific reports · 2022Trial
- Mental health benefits of a 1-week intensive multimodal group program for adolescents with multiple adverse childhood experiences.Child abuse & neglect · 2021Trial
- The Danish Region Midt Schizophrenia Cohort - Representative, long-term follow-up of first-episode schizophrenia spectrum disorder.Acta neuropsychiatrica · 2026Article
- Impact of psychosocial stress in early life on pace of aging in young adulthood.Clinical epigenetics · 2025Article
- Adolescent depression, childhood maltreatment, and the immune system; a role for epigenetic aging?Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2025Article
- Cortisol, DHEAS, and the cortisol/DHEAS ratio as predictors of epigenetic age acceleration.Biogerontology · 2025Article
- Mediational effect analysis of childhood emotional abuse on prodromal psychotic symptoms in self-taught examination students.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Associations of multiple adverse childhood experiences, attachment insecurity and loneliness with physical and mental health difficulties in a representative Slovak sample.Preventive medicine reports · 2025Article
- Childhood family adversity and recurrent depression in adulthood: the findings of three ELSA-Brasil follow-up visits.Revista brasileira de psiquiatria (Sao Paulo, Brazil : 1999) · 2025Article
- Article
- Lifetime chronic stress exposures, stress hormones, and biological aging: Results from the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2025Article
- Study on the age-period-cohort effects of cognitive abilities among older Chinese adults based on the cognitive reserve hypothesis.BMC geriatrics · 2024Article
- Using non-invasive behavioral and physiological data to measure biological age in wild baboons.GeroScience · 2024Article
- Adverse Childhood Experiences and Risk of Abnormal Body Mass Index: A Global Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- The Impact of Childhood Mental Health and Substance Use on Methylation Aging Into Adulthood.Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · 2024Article
- Maternal Adverse Childhood Experiences and Biological Aging During Pregnancy and in Newborns.JAMA network open · 2024Article
- Grandparents' educational attainment is associated with grandchildren's epigenetic-based age acceleration in the National Growth and Health Study.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2024Article
- Individual longitudinal changes in DNA-methylome identify signatures of early-life adversity and correlate with later outcome.Neurobiology of stress · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundEpigenetic mechanisms may partly explain the persistent effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on health outcomes in later life. DNA methylation can predict chronological age, and advanced methylation-predicted age beyond chronological age (DNA methylation age acceleration) is associated with ACEs, adverse mental and physical health, and elevated diurnal and baseline salivary cortisol. Childhood adversity is also associated with dysregulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, which produces the neuroendocrine hormone cortisol. It remains unknown whether these associations are specific to certain types of adversity. Herein, we investigate the associations of ACEs with DNA methylation age acceleration and plasma cortisol in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) birth cohort.
methodsIn this study of the children in ALSPAC, we used multiple linear regression to examine associations of cumulative exposure to ACE, as well as exposure to ten individual types of ACEs, with Horvath-estimated DNA methylation age acceleration and with baseline plasma cortisol. The ten ACEs were those included in the World Health Organization's ACE International Questionnaire. Data on ACEs were prospectively collected from age 0-14 years. DNA methylation age acceleration and plasma cortisol were measured at mean 17.1 years and 15.5 years, respectively.
resultsWe included 974 UK children in the present study. Exposure to four or more ACEs compared to zero was associated with DNA methylation age acceleration in girls (β, 95% CI = 1.65, 0.25 to 3.04 years) but not in boys (β, 95% CI = - 0.11, - 1.48 to 1.26 years). Also, in girls, emotional abuse and physical abuse were each associated with DNA methylation age acceleration (β, 95% CI = 1.20, 0.15 to 2.26 years and β, 95% CI = 1.22, 0.06 to 2.38 years, respectively). No other ACEs were associated with accelerated DNA methylation age in either sex. Associations were also null between ACE and cortisol, and cortisol and DNA methylation age acceleration.
conclusionsIn this prospective population-based study of UK children, cumulative ACE exposure, emotional abuse, and physical abuse between age 0 and 14 years were each associated with Horvath-estimated DNA methylation age acceleration at age 17 years in girls but not in boys.
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