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What the heck are ACEs?

Just about any discussion these days will reference the Kaiser Permanente ACE Study as one of the seminal works on how childhood trauma can have lifelong consequences on the physical as well as mental health of survivors. Anda et. al (1998) coined the phrase "Adverse Childhood Experiences" (ACEs) to refer to the traumatic events in the study.

In the initial study, they asked ten questions about events that happened before 18. Some were one-time, or acute, events, and some happened over longer periods, causing chronic trauma. They were simple "yes or no" questions that didn't take long to answer...

In fact, let's pause for a moment for you to go take the quiz.

Go ahead, I'll wait....

https://americanspcc.org/take-the-aces-quiz/

You get the idea. The number of "Yes" answers is your "ACE Score."

So this study was huge...17,000 respondents over two years. That's pretty good data.

Here's the doozie...in the study, they found that for each point on the ACE score, respondents' health outlooks got worse and worse.

And ACEs are really common. 63.9% had at least one ACE, and 12.5% had four or more. And that was just on these ten questions, so not every type of trauma was covered.

Think about that...at least 6 out of every 10 people you know has baggage. For me, that's reason enough to take a pause and try to have empathy for others. We don't know what they are carrying around, and chances are, it's pretty heavy stuff.

#adverse childhood experiences #trauma #research #dissertation #mgbdissposts

Fight, Flight, or Freeze

Alright, children, gather 'round. Aunt Maggi is going to tell you a story.

Once upon a time, a long time ago (though not so long if you ask our DNA), humans didn't have homes to lock at night or grocery stores to get our food. As romantic as it sounds to sleep under the stars and forage for berries, life wasn't easy. Threats could come from literally everywhere.

Sleep in the wrong place and <BAM!> a predator could jump out of nowhere and get you.

Think you're at the top of the food chain with that bow and arrow. <BAM!> Think again!

Tarantulas, tigers, tornadoes, tonsilitis...so many horrible ways to die.

So your brain figured out that the best chance of surviving is to give you temporary superpowers. Remember your brain basics? That little amygdala sends up the bat signal that prepares your body to defend itself (fight), run away (flight), or blend in with the scenery (freeze).

Here is what it's supposed to look like:

Fast-forward to today, and the brain is confused. The amygdala wants to do its job, but for many of us, there just isn't much for it to do. It can start making up threats, which this video explains with cute animations: https://youtu.be/rpolpKTWrp4

Trauma is different. These events are actual threats. This is what the amygdala was made for - kick in survival mode, deal with the threat, and then calm down. Traumatization occurs when, for a variety of reasons, it gets stuck in high gear. We'll talk about that more next time.

#research #dissertation #education #childhood trauma #neurotransmitters #mgbdissposts

Types of Trauma

So now that you're caught up on ACEs, let's talk about why that study was just a starting point. The initial ten questions covered a lot of territory, but not every kind of trauma. So the research is continuing. Erdman et al. (2020) wrote one of the more recent books on trauma and learning.

Btw, I HIGHLY recommend this book for anyone who works with children...easy to reference, well-organized.

They talk about four main categories: household and family, loss, family separation, and violence and disaster. Yeah, a global pandemic definitely counts.

Now, not everyone is traumatized by traumatic events. We'll talk about that another time. For now, here's the list. Would you like me to further explain any of these?

Household and Family

Physical Abuse

Emotional Abuse

Sexual Abuse

Neglect

Family Dysfunction

Financial Instability

Severe and Chronic Illness

Family Discord

Financial Insecurity and Poverty

Loss

Loss of someone important to the child

Traumatic grief

Family Separation

Refugees and Migrants

Incarceration

Deployment

Divorce

Violence and Disorder

Gun Violence

Natural and Human-Made Disasters

Automobile Crashes

Personal Injury and Assault or Witnessing Violence

Terrorism

Historical Trauma

#research #childhood trauma #education #dissertation #adverse childhood experiences #mgbdissposts

Small bites at the elephant...

There’s an old joke.

How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

So, I’m one of those people who decided to pursue a doctorate, even though writing is not one of my favorite pasttimes. Since this involves the Herculean task of writing “the big book report,” it was suggested to use a platform where I enjoy writing to create mini-essays on my topic. It sounded like a great time to dust off my old tumblr accounts and see what happens. If history holds, I’ll write about 4 posts and then never touch this again. Or maybe this will be the brilliant start to making my dissertation super-fabulous.

Wanna help me be fabulous? Ask me stuff.

Here’s my topic.

We know a lot about gifted students and learning. We’re starting to know about how trauma affects learning. We don’t know much yet about how gifted kids process trauma.

I’m fleshing out my introduction and literature review, and starting to put together my methodology. What big questions do you have on this?

#dissertation #childhood trauma #research #education #mgbdissposts