The Effects of Child Abuse in Adulthood
Have you ever seen a child in class, at the playground or even in a store and wondered where her black eye came from, or why the little boy in front of you has bruises covering his arms? Child abuse has many facets and is hard to put into a single definition; however, it can be narrowed down to “when a parent or caregiver, whether through action or failing to act, causes injury, death, emotional harm or risk of serious harm to a child”(O’Meara and Fedderson, n.d., para. 1). Some of us couldn’t imagine harming an innocent child, yet some parents and caregivers do inflict such harmful actions on the children they are supposed to be nurturing. Child abuse doesn’t affect a certain social class or even a specific ethnic group, it can impact every type of person. Child abuse can happen worldwide; however, according to Robert Feldman, author of Child Development, “at least five children are killed by their parents or caretakers every day, and 140,000 others are physically injured every year [in the …show more content…
Abuse can take many different forms including sexual, physical and emotional but they can all effect the brain negatively. As stated by Maia Szalavitz, “researchers have found specific changes in key regions in and around the hippocampus in the brains of young adults who were maltreated or neglected in childhood” (Szalavitz, 2012, para. 2) The hippocampus is very vulnerable to stress hormones and when abuse occurs or the fear of future abuse, those hormones are released. When the stress hormones reach a high activity level, it can cause extreme harm to the hippocampus and eventually can fail to function properly. Kimberly Shipman reports, “Children who have been maltreated are at risk for experiencing a host of mental health problems including depression, post-traumatic stress, dissociation…” (Shipman, 2009, p.
Have you ever seen a child in class, at the playground or even in a store and wondered where her black eye came from, or why the little boy in front of you has bruises covering his arms? Child abuse has many facets and is hard to put into a single definition; however, it can be narrowed down to “when a parent or caregiver, whether through action or failing to act, causes injury, death, emotional harm or risk of serious harm to a child”(O’Meara and Fedderson, n.d., para. 1). Some of us couldn’t imagine harming an innocent child, yet some parents and caregivers do inflict such harmful actions on the children they are supposed to be nurturing. Child abuse doesn’t affect a certain social class or even a specific ethnic group, it can impact every type of person. Child abuse can happen worldwide; however, according to Robert Feldman, author of Child Development, “at least five children are killed by their parents or caretakers every day, and 140,000 others are physically injured every year [in the …show more content…
Abuse can take many different forms including sexual, physical and emotional but they can all effect the brain negatively. As stated by Maia Szalavitz, “researchers have found specific changes in key regions in and around the hippocampus in the brains of young adults who were maltreated or neglected in childhood” (Szalavitz, 2012, para. 2) The hippocampus is very vulnerable to stress hormones and when abuse occurs or the fear of future abuse, those hormones are released. When the stress hormones reach a high activity level, it can cause extreme harm to the hippocampus and eventually can fail to function properly. Kimberly Shipman reports, “Children who have been maltreated are at risk for experiencing a host of mental health problems including depression, post-traumatic stress, dissociation…” (Shipman, 2009, p.