Health

The vicious cycle of trauma: Suffering is passed down through generations study reveals


Your ancestors’ trauma has a direct impact on your health, according to a burgeoning field of research.

A new study found the sons of Union Army soldiers, who did not experience the devastation of the Civil War, had a higher risk of early death if their fathers had been prisoners of war.

The findings held even after controlling for other factors that influence lifespan, including economic status and family life.

The researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, concluded that the correlation must be yet another example of trauma being passed down genetically.

A new study found the sons of Union Army soldiers, who did not experience the devastation of the Civil War, had a higher risk of early death if their fathers had been prisoners of war

A new study found the sons of Union Army soldiers, who did not experience the devastation of the Civil War, had a higher risk of early death if their fathers had been prisoners of war

A new study found the sons of Union Army soldiers, who did not experience the devastation of the Civil War, had a higher risk of early death if their fathers had been prisoners of war

HOW TRAUMA IMPACTS THE SUFFERER 

Trauma puts the body into defense mode, sending blood pumping to your major muscles ready to fight, driving up blood sugar levels, flooding the body with the stress hormone cortisol, with a rush endorphins so we can block out the pain. 

That experience – whether it’s momentary or repeated – has an impact on cells.    

A century ago, there was little to suggest that the impact lasted long at all. But that started to change within the field of psychology in the early- to mid-20th century. 

First, 19th century French neurologist Jean Martin Charcot was the first to show that trauma caused mental illness, with the first ever study revealing hysteria was not a uterus disorder (commonly treated with hysterectomies) but stemmed from psychological suffering.

Soon after, researchers started to join the dots between trauma, mental illness and physical illness. Among other things, the two World Wars drove researchers to investigate the ramifications of pain and suffering.

But it wasn’t until around 2002 that a scientist, Rachel Yehuda of Mount Sinai, was able to demonstrate how trauma infected and affected generation after generation.

Even today, most of us are inclined to see trauma as an immediate experience, perhaps leaving a last impact on people who endured particularly harrowing ordeals.

But now, the medical community broadly agrees that traumatic experiences – such as sexual assault, a tough upbringing, divorce, or the death of a loved-one – has a long-lasting impact on the sufferer’s health. 

For example, studies have shown trauma can have a lingering impact the brain, limiting the ability to create memories, and keeping the person on high alert. 

It can also increase risks of high blood pressure, diabetes, and heart disease. Last month, Pitt School of Medicine showed sexual assault survivors have double the risk of hypertension. Another study, published in 2015 by Georgia Regents University, showed childhood trauma was linked to hypertension later in life.

As top PTSD researcher Bessel van der Kolk put it in his book The Body Keeps The Score: ‘In response to the trauma itself, and in coping with the dread that persisted long afterward, these patients had learned to shut down the brain areas that transmit the visceral feelings and emotions that accompany and define terror.’

HOW TRAUMA IS PASSED THROUGH GENERATIONS

Those changes Van der Kolk describes are the ones that appear to have a ‘transgenerational’ effect. 

The mid-20th century gave rise to the relatively new field of epigenetics, the biological study of genes that switch on and off. A turning point for this area of research was the Dutch famine at the end of the Second World War, which led to two generations of smaller-than-average babies being born, and was later tipped as the first recognized example of ‘inherited trauma’. 

Since, the field has gained weight, particularly in the last two decades. 

A groundbreaking study in 2013 showed mice can inherit their grandparents’ and parents’ fears, and that that fear can even be triggered by the same smell – even if they didn’t experience the pain themselves. Crucially, the team at Emory University showed, this was not the result of a genetic mutation, but of a ‘chemical modification’ to DNA that blocked a gene’s expression, without altering it. 

A study in 2017 showed the daughters of Finnish women separated from their parents during the Second World War had higher rates of psychiatric hospitalization. 

Earlier this year, a Canadian study showed Indigenous women have a 20 percent higher risk of post-partum depression than white women, which was attributed to generations of trauma and suffering. 

Some have even suggested that the staggering, historic rates of poor health in the south, while driven by inactivity and poor diet, could also be tied to the history of trauma suffered in that region. 

THE NEW STUDY

The new study, published this week in the journal PNAS, looked at the sons of Union Army soldiers between 1863 and 1864, when prisoner of war camps were so brutal that deaths from diarrhea and scurvy were more common than not.

The researchers analyzed data on 4,758 men who were born after the war ended, whose fathers had served in the Union Army, and who had survived to at least the age 45.

They found those whose fathers had spent time in a POW camp were more than twice as likely to die early than their peers whose fathers had fought but were not imprisoned.  

Stroke and cancer were the most common causes of death, which researchers said is likely linked to their fathers’ forced fasting, as has been shown in previous studies in mice.

‘Our findings point to the importance of paternal stress on sons’ longevity at older ages, a transmission that may have occurred through epigenetic channels,’ the authors write. 

‘Whether the findings can be generalized to more recent populations is unknown. Improvements in the adequacy of maternal nutrition in developed countries today should reduce epigenetic transmission.’ 

They posit that these effects may be even more pronounced in the descendents of POWs who were held in Japan and Vietnam, since those camps utilized torture, while Civil War camps did not. 

‘The findings provide “proof of concept” for the transmission and reversibility of paternal trauma in a human population,’ they concluded. 



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