What Does ACE Stand For in Safeguarding?

Things that we experience in our childhood can have a significant impact on how we grow and develop, often without us even being consciously aware of it. In many cases, children will grow up having had a relatively happy and settled childhood, but some encounter serious challenges or go through traumatic events which can have a lasting impact.

Safeguarding professionals have a range of responsibilities, many of which interact with the concept of adverse childhood experiences (ACE). They should be aware of the warning signs of different kinds of abuse and trauma which may put a child in danger, but should also understand how these experiences can impact development and behaviour and the best way to manage this to give the child the best chance at a normal and easy life.

In this article, we explore what ACE stands for in safeguarding, the main types of adverse childhood experiences, and the impact that these can have on childhood development.

What is ACE in Safeguarding?

ACE stands for adverse childhood experience, which refers to stressful or traumatic events that happen during childhood between the ages of 1 and 17. These events can be singular, repeated, or someone might experience multiple traumatic events whilst growing up.

A 2023 meta-analysis study by Madigan et al. estimated that around 40% of the population have never experienced an ACE, with 22% experiencing one, 13% experiencing two, 9% experiencing three and 16% experiencing four or more. This means that roughly 60% of people will experience at least one adverse childhood experience before they become an adult, making it an issue that affects over half of the population.

Adverse childhood experiences have been found to have a range of impacts on both physical and mental health, leading to problems during childhood and into adulthood as well. It can also have a significant impact on a child’s attachment style, which can make it hard for them to form relationships as a young person and an adult.

Understanding ACEs childhood trauma and how to handle children who have had these experiences is a key part of safeguarding, as it can help to minimise the long-term damage that can be done.

What Are the 10 Adverse Childhood Experiences?

All kinds of experiences in childhood can be classed as traumatic, but one of the largest studies into ACEs done by the CDC-Kaiser Permanente identified that there were ten key experiences. Five of these are personal experiences and five are related to family members.

Below, we’ll explain what each of these experiences involves.

Physical Abuse

Physical abuse involves being subject to any kind of physical harm. This could be through being punched, hit, slapped, thrown or kicked, or harmed by being burned, scratched or stabbed. Physical abuse might be perpetuated by a family member or by a peer, and may have potentially resulted in serious injuries.

Sexual Abuse

Sexual abuse involves any kind of unwanted sexual activity, and in the context of ACEs childhood trauma involves all kinds of sexual activity with a minor. Someone who has been sexually abused might have been raped or forced into prostitution, they might have witnessed indecent exposure, or they might have been exploited into being involved in the production of pornography.

Verbal Abuse

Verbal abuse, also known as emotional abuse, involves mental and psychological bullying that causes emotional harm to the target. The abuse may be spoken or written down and accompanied by other behaviour that is designed to intimidate, threaten and manipulate someone.

Physical Neglect

Physical neglect involves failing to meet a child’s basic needs and either deliberately or unintentionally denying them access to food, water, warmth, hygiene products and shelter. It also involves failing to give them appropriate medical care, such as ignoring doctors' appointments and neglecting to supervise them, such as leaving young children unattended at home.

Emotional Neglect

Emotional neglect involves failing to give a child the appropriate attention, support and affection needed for them to mentally develop in a healthy way. It can also involve emotional abuse, but is primarily about ignoring or dismissing a child’s emotional needs so that they don’t feel cared for.

Family Mental Illness

A member of the family having a mental illness can mean that a child isn’t properly taken care of or that they are exposed to upsetting and traumatic behaviour. This can lead to forms of abuse and neglect as a result of a family member’s mental illness, or leave the child with traumatic memories.

Losing a Parent

The loss of a parent or caregiver could happen as a result of a breakup, divorce or death. These can all be negative experiences for a child, both because of the loss of the family member and the impact this has on their care, and also because of the impact it might have on other family members and caregivers.

Substance Abuse at Home

If a child lives with someone who partakes in substance abuse, they might suffer because addiction to a substance takes priority over their care. Adults who abuse substances like drugs and alcohol might also be more likely to abuse or neglect their family members, adding to the adverse childhood experiences.

Witnessing Abuse

A child may not be subject to abuse themselves, but seeing any kind of abuse perpetrated towards another family member can be very traumatic and distressing. Living with a mother who is being abused is particularly damaging, as children often form a primary attachment to their mother and suffer more if she is abused in their presence.

Imprisonment

The last of the 10 adverse childhood experiences is imprisonment. If someone in a child’s family is imprisoned whilst they are young it can lead to feelings of abandonment, or may have resulted in them being exposed to illegal activity before the family member was incarcerated. 

The Impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences

Adverse childhood experiences happen when someone’s brain is still developing. This can lead to increased cognitive challenges throughout the rest of the child’s life, from mental health issues to problems sustaining relationships.

Many studies have found that traumatic events cause long-term stress in children, which in turn can limit brain development. This can cause a range of outcomes, including:

• An increased risk of developing mental health conditions like anxiety and depression
• An increased difficulty in their ability to manage and control their emotions
• An increased struggle in making and maintaining friendships and relationships
• An increased difficulty in managing behaviour in a school environment

A study conducted by Public Health Wales found that people who had suffered more than four examples of adverse childhood experiences were much more likely to report an increased risk of various mental and physical health issues. These included:

• Being two times more likely to have a chronic disease
• Being three times more likely to develop coronary heart disease
• Being four times more likely to drink heavily
• Being fifteen times more likely to commit acts of violence
• Being twenty times more likely to end up in prison

The more items on the list of adverse childhood experiences that someone had suffered from, the bigger the impact it has on their development and the more challenges they are likely to face. It’s also more likely that a parent who has suffered from ACEs will pass on these experiences to their children.

ACE in Safeguarding

If you have a safeguarding responsibility to children then ACEs are likely something that you’ll come across in your role. This might either involve identifying that a child has suffered from a traumatic experience and organising intervention to help minimise the impact, or dealing with children who have developmental issues because of early adverse experiences.

Adverse childhood experiences affect every child differently and may cause a wide range of issues that safeguarding professionals like teachers have to deal with. From a safeguarding perspective, one of the most important things you can do is learn how to identify when a child might be acting a certain way because of an ACE. 

If traumatic experiences in their past are already known, you can take action to arrange the necessary support through things like counselling. If there isn’t a known history of trauma but you suspect or have been told that the child is experiencing something harmful, you should contact your safeguarding lead or social services immediately.

Another of the most important aspects of dealing with ACE in safeguarding is to ensure that there is a shift in perspective from focusing on what a child might be doing wrong, such as being disruptive to understanding what has caused this behaviour. By focusing on causation and dealing with the deep-rooted impact of trauma instead of punishing the resulting actions, the outcome is more positive for everyone involved.

ACE safeguarding training is extremely helpful in providing you with information to help spot signs of adverse childhood experiences and the impact that they can have on young people. This will likely be given as part of regular safeguarding training and incorporated into your internal policies about dealing with children who might have behavioural or learning difficulties.

FAQs

How does Keeping Children Safe in Education define ACEs?

The official government school safeguarding guidance known as Keeping Children Safe in Education defines ACEs as experiences which “can have a lasting impact throughout childhood, adolescence and into adulthood.” It also highlights that school staff must be aware of how these experiences can impact a child’s “mental health, behaviour, attendance and progress at school”.

Adverse childhood experiences are categorised as what type of trauma?

Adverse childhood experiences are generally categorised as psychological trauma, although they can involve physically and emotionally traumatic experiences as well. This is because, even though someone might not fully remember what happened to them, it can have a lasting impact on their mental health and consequently their physical health too.

How do adverse childhood experiences impact brain development?

Brain development happens throughout childhood and adolescence, which means that the experiences we have at this time impact whether our brains grow normally and healthily. If a child is subject to stress because of traumatic experiences, research has found that this can disrupt healthy brain development and lead to memory problems, learning difficulties, emotional dysregulation and delayed information processing.

Summary

Some young people who have encountered adverse childhood experiences may have been too young to properly remember what happened to them, but that doesn’t mean that the long-term impact is lessened. Children’s brains develop all the way to the end of adolescence, meaning that traumatic experiences at any age can impact cognitive development and lead to future problems.

The good news is that almost all levels of trauma and development damage can be managed and resolved with the right approach. Safeguarding professionals play a key part in this, which is why it’s so important to understand the link between ACEs and development.

If you’d like to find out more about child development and what can impact this, our online ‘Early Child Development Foundation’ course covers a variety of topics and provides a thorough understanding of the areas that impact how children develop.