Adverse childhood experiences, bullying, inflammation and BMI in 10-year-old children: The biological embodiment

PLoS One. 2022 Aug 19;17(8):e0273329. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0273329. eCollection 2022.

Abstract

Exposure to adversity during the first years of life might already be biologically embedded well before adult life. Thus, the impact of different stressful experiences needs to be explored. This study aims to examine if the association between being victimized (adverse childhood experiences-ACEs and bullying) and (hs-) C-Reactive Protein (CRP) is explained by the influence of adversity on the body mass index (BMI) of the child. We included children from the Portuguese birth cohort Generation XXI (n = 3712) that at 10 years of age completed a questionnaire on the exposure to ACEs and bullying victimization, assessed by an adaptation from the original ACEs study and an adaptation of The Bully Scale Survey, respectively. Following an overnight fast, a venous blood sample was collected by trained nurses and hs-CRP was assayed in fresh blood samples. Weight and height were measured with the child in underwear and bare feet. Weight was measured to the nearest one-tenth of a kilogram with the use of a digital scale (Tanita), and height was measured to the nearest one-tenth of a centimetre with the use of a wall stadiometer (seca®). BMI was calculated as the value of weight (kg) over squared height (m), and computed as an age- and sex-specific BMI standard deviation (SD) score (z-score), according to the World Health Organization Child Growth Standards (5-19 years). Regression coefficients and respective 95% Confidence Interval [β(95%CI)] were computed using path analysis. We observed that ACEs had a positive total effect on hs-CRP at the age of 10 years (β = 0.06; 95%CI: -0.02; 0.15). A direct effect (β = 0.02; 95%CI: -0.01; 0.06) accounted for 66.1% of the association between ACEs and hs-CRP. A positive total effect of bullying victimization on hs-CRP (β = 0.20; 95%CI: 0.06; 0.34) was observed. A direct effect (β = 0.08; 95%CI: -0.05; 0.21) accounted for 40.0% of the association, while an indirect effect through BMI (β = 0.12; 95%CI: 0.06; 0.18) explained 60.0% of the pathway between bullying victimization and hs-CRP. Results suggest that there might be different mechanisms involved in the biological embedding of childhood experiences. BMI seems to explain a great part of the association between exposure to bullying victimization and hs-CRP at 10 years of age. Further research is still needed to better understand the mechanisms explaining the emergence and persistence of health poorer outcomes later in life for victims of abuse.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Adverse Childhood Experiences*
  • Body Mass Index
  • Bullying*
  • C-Reactive Protein
  • Child
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Inflammation
  • Male

Substances

  • C-Reactive Protein

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the Operational Programme Competitiveness and Internationalization and national funding from the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education under the projects “BioAdversity: How childhood social adversity shapes health: The biology of social adversity” (POCI-01- 0145-FEDER-016838; PTDC/DTP-EPI/1687/2014), “HIneC: When do health inequalities start? Understanding the impact of childhood social adversity on health trajectories from birth to early adolescence” (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-029567; PTDC/SAU-PUB/29567/2017). It is also supported by the Unidade de Investigação em Epidemiologia - Instituto de Saúde Pública da Universidade do Porto (EPIUnit) (UIDB/04750/2020) and Laboratório para a Investigação Integrativa e Translacional em Saúde Populacional (ITR) (LA/P/0064/2020), Administração Regional de Saúde Norte (Regional Department of Ministry of Health) and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian; PhD Grant SFRH/BD/108742/2015 (to SS) co-funded by FCT and the Human Capital Operational Programme (POCH/FSE Program); FCT Investigator contracts CEECIND/01516/2017 (to SF) and IF/01060/2015 (to ACS). This study is also a result of the project DOCnet (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000003), supported by the Norte Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, publication decision, or manuscript preparation.