Individuals who suffer trauma in child- and adulthood may experience a greater amount of cognitive decline as they age than individuals who haven’t experienced trauma, a new study found.
The research, published in June in the Journal of Traumatic Stress, also found that recent trauma suffered in adulthood has a larger impact on some aspects of cognitive functioning than trauma in childhood.
"We found that the more adverse events experienced, such as your parents' divorce or a parent dying, the greater the cognitive decline," said Margie Lachman, the Minnie and Harold Fierman Professor of Psychology, who co-authored the study with psychology graduate student Kristin Lynch MS ’18.
Lynch, who earned her master’s in psychology in a year in Lachman’s lab, was first author on the journal article. Her thesis explored the effect of lifetime trauma exposure on the relationship between age and religiosity
Sign up with your email to receive news and updates.