Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) and Dating Violence Victimization in Young Adulthood

Background and Purpose: Dating violence is prevalent in South Korea. Although statistics present that over 60% of adults experienced dating violence victimization, dating violence tends to be perceived as a personal problem in intimate relationships in Korea. Social learning perspectives and previous studies suggest that Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are one of the critical risk factors for involving interpersonal violence in adulthood, which in turn lead to numerous physical and mental health consequences. This research examines the graded associations between cumulative ACEs and dating violence victimization in Korean young adults.

Methods: This study conducted a self-administered online survey in 2021. A national sample of college students (N=1037) completed the survey. The sample of the current study included college students who reported having haddany dating experience since age 18 (N=584). The dependent variable, dating violence victimization, was assessed by seven items of physical violence from the Conflict Tactic Scale. The independent variable, ACEs, was the total number of ACEs (range 0-10), aggregated from ten binary indicators : emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional neglect, physical neglect, parental separation/divorce, intimate partner violence, family member’s substance abuse, family member’s mental illness, and family member’s incarceration in childhood. Following previous studies, the number of ACEs was categorized into four subgroups: no ACEs (reference), ACEs score of 1-2, ACEs score of 3, and ACEs score of 4 or more. We conducted a logistic regression analysis to test the association of cumulative ACEs with dating violence victimization, controlling for sociodemographic characteristics (age, sex, college location, parents’ education, household monthly income, and health status).

Results: Approximately 24% of the analysis sample reported dating violence victimization in emerging adulthood. The most frequently reported ACEs included emotional neglect (29%), physical abuse (24%), and intimate partner violence (23%). The least reported ACE item was family incarceration (2%). As literature suggests that childhood adversities often co-occur, almost 19% of the sample had an ACEs score of 4 or more, 13% of the sample had an ACEs score of 3, 15% of the sample had an ACEs of 2, 19% of the sample had an ACEs score of 1, and 34% of the sample had an ACEs score of 0 (reference group). The logistic regression analysis presented that dating violence victimization was significantly higher for college students with an ACE score of 1-2 (odds ratio = 2.07, p< .01), an ACE score of 3 (odds ratio = 2.46, p< .05), and an ACE score of 4 or more (odds ratio = 3.61, p< .001), compared to the group with no ACEs controlling for covariates.

Discussion and Implications: Our findings support that early adverse experiences are connected to interpersonal violence in young adulthood. This study discusses and calls for collective actions aimed at integrating ACEs into preventive interventions for dating violence victimization in emerging adulthood.