Common Effects of Abuse Outline

The following is an outline explaining some common effects of abuse experienced by children from violent households.

Emotional Effects:

• Guilt: the child feels guilty for the abuse and their inability to stop it. These children may generalize this guilt to other situations and admit guilt even when they have done nothing wrong.
• Grief: the child grieves for the loss of a normal family relationship and for their personal losses.
• Confusion: the child has conflicting feelings about their parents. They often have love/hate relationships with their parents. They know their parents are supposed to love and protect them, but this does not match with their visions of the abuse and violence between their parents.
• Fear: the child has a fear of abandonment, fear that their mother will be killed or permanently injured, fear that their parents will be unable to care for them, fear of the power and violence their father exhibits, fear of expressing their emotions or doing anything which could trigger an episode of violence, fear of the unknown, and fear of personal injury. They may also have recurring nightmares.
• Anger: the child feels angry about the violence and chaos in their home. They learn to solve their problems with violence. They may feel angry toward other children who have a normal family.
• Depression: it is common for children in domestically violent homes to suffer depression, feelings of hopelessness, and feelings of powerlessness. These children often become victims of peer pressure or bullies.
• Embarrassment: the child feels embarrassed by the effects of the abuse and the dynamics at home. They do not invite playmates to their home for fear of their friends seeing the effects of the violence in their home.
• Worry: these children often want to go home because they are worried about their mother’s and younger siblings’ safety
• Difficulty dealing with strong emotions such as anger, fear, guilt, sadness, etc.
• Inability to act for themselves or protect themselves
• Little or no empathy for others
• Quick bonds with unfamiliar adults (due to poor attachment with caregivers)
• No connection to their own feelings

Cognitive Effects - Children from violent homes often:

• Have less developed thinking skills, less ability to concentrate, and a short attention span
• Blame others for their own behavior
• Believe it is acceptable to hit people they care about in order to get what they want, to express their anger, to feel powerful, or to get others to meet their needs.
• Have a low self-concept originating from a sense of their family’s powerlessness
• Do not ask for what they need or want
• Do not trust others
• Believe that to feel anger (or any feelings) is bad because people get hurt
• Have rigid sex role stereotypes
• Display either fight/flight symptoms or dissociative symptoms
• Engage in “black-and-white thinking”-- cannot understand subtleties
• Have speech disorders and/or difficulty with language activities such as reading
• Experience delays or regression in development

Physiological Effects

• Somatic complaints (headaches, stomachaches, etc.)
• Nervousness, anxiety, and a short attention span
• Overreactions to minor stimuli because constantly alert
• Tiredness or lethargy due to lack of sleep (domestic violence often occurs at night after the children are in bed)
• Frequently ill
• Poor personal hygiene or lack of proper medical care
• Regression in development (bedwetting, thumb-sucking, and other signs of stress)
• Desensitization to pain
• High risk play and activities
• Self-abuse (cutting, picking at scabs, etc.)
• High level of stress

Social Effects

• Isolation from friends and relatives because must keep family secret
• Low social skills -- poor understanding of social situations
• Learned attitudes supporting violence
• Relationships are frequently stormy -- start intensely and end abruptly -- difficulty maintaining relationships or making lasting friends
• Difficulty in trusting, especially adults
• Poor anger management and problem solving skills
• Excessive social involvement in order to avoid going home (especially true in teens)
• Passivity with peers or bully peers
• Exploitive relationships, either as the victim or the perpetrator
• Very rough play with peers gets exceedingly rough
• Low self-esteem
• Withdrawal into books or television
• Lack of trust with adults

Behavioral Effects (often in extremes):

• Increased externalized behaviors such as aggression toward others, fighting, bullying, dating violence, destruction of property, and antisocial behaviors such as lying or stealing
• Increased internalized behaviors such as withdrawal, fearfulness, reluctance to try new things, anxiety
• Overachieving or underachieving
• Refusal to go to school (feel they must stay home to protect mother)
• Acts in a caretaking role -- more concerned for others than self -- or acts as a parent substitute, especially to younger children
• Extremely aggressive or passive
• Rigid defenses (may be sarcastic, aloof, or defensive)
• Excessive attention-seeking behaviors
• Bedwetting and nightmares
• Out of control behavior, unable to set own limits or follow directions or school rules
• Aggression toward their mother (or the victim)