Childhood Stress May Cause Genetic Changes

A new research effort comes to the conclusion that major stress during childhood can change a person’s biological risk for psychiatric disorders.

Researchers from Butler Hospital at Brown University believe childhood adversity may lead to epigenetic changes in the human glucocorticoid receptor gene, an important regulator of the biological stress response that may increase risk for psychiatric disorders.

The research is published online in PLoS ONE.

Experts have known that childhood adversity, including parental loss and childhood maltreatment, can increase the risk for psychiatric disorders such as depression and anxiety. However, researchers have yet to define how and why this association exists in humans.

"We need to understand the biology of this effect in order to develop better treatment and prevention programs," said Audrey Tyrka, M.D., Ph.D. "Our research group turned to the field of epigenetics to determine how environmental conditions in childhood can influence the biological stress response."

Epigenetics is the study of changes to the genome that do not alter the DNA sequence, but influence whether genes will be expressed, or "turned on," versus whether they will be silenced.

Childhood Stress And Stress Management Tips Symptoms of Childhood Stress Symptoms of stress include stomach aches, headaches, bed wetting, cold and sweaty hands, temper tantrums, depression, anxiety disorders, grinding teeth, irritability, nervousness, emotional withdrawal and many others. It is imperative that parents, elders or guardians recognize these stress symptoms and address the stressful situation so that the child gets to lead a normal, happy life.

Stress from Environmental Factors

A study that appeared in the Nov/Dec issue of Child Development found secure relationships with parents and teachers protect children from rising cortisol levels in stressful situations. The study suggested that care givers in childcare facilities sometimes increased kids' stress levels. According to medical experts the sudden spike in cortisol, a stress hormone is of grave concern because frequent increase of cortisol levels can have a negative impact on health.

A study supported by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, suggests that pathogenic effects of stress caused by a traumatic childhood experience including sexual abuse, emotional abuse, physical and emotional neglect can interact with other risk factors and trigger chronic fatigue syndrome symptoms during adulthood by affecting the central nervous system, neuroendocrine system and immune systems.

In the current study, researchers sought to study if genetic level changes could explain the connection between childhood maltreatment and psychiatric disorders.