Background: Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) refer to a semantic field of negative childhood events that, in conjunction with insufficient personal, family, or contextual coping resources, have the potential of becoming traumatic.
Objective: To assess the prevalence of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and their association with sociodemographic variables and physical and mental illnesses in a Mexican sample.
Design: A cross-sectional design was used. The sample included 917 Mexican adults who responded to the Adverse Childhood Experiences International Questionnaire (ACE-IQ). Most of the participants were female (79.3%) with an average age of 37 years, a monthly income between 500 and 2,500 USD (59.2%), had completed university education (45.6%) and were married or in a common-law marriage (53.1%). Data was collected through Google Forms, and the link to the form was shared through electronic social networks.
Results: A total of 48.3% of the participants presented seven to nine types of ACEs. Among their responses, the most prevalent categories were emotional neglect (95.1%), family violence (83.3%), and emotional abuse (78.6%). A significant association was found between the number of ACEs and the mental illness diagnosis (x2(20) = 15.16; p<001). Women were found to report more experiences of sexual abuse (z = -6.62, p<. 001), whereas men reported more experiences of community violence (z= -4.27, p < .001) and collective violence (z = -3.94, p<.001).
Conclusions: The prevalence of ACEs in the Mexican population is high. However, men and women reported differences in certain types of ACEs. It was found that people with a diagnosis and family history of mental illnesses presented a higher number of ACE categories.
Keywords: ACE-IQ; ACEs prevalence; Adverse Childhood Experiences; community violence; mental illnesses; sexual abuse.
© Lomonosov Moscow State University, 2023© Russian Psychological Society, 2023.