Resisting the Cycle of Violence: Impact of Childhood Abuse and Neglect on Individual and Relationship Functioning in Early Career Enlisted Air Force Male Service Members

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have been consistently associated with worse physical and mental health outcomes in adulthood (Felitti et al., 1998; Merrick et al., 2019) as well as higher risk for relationship dysfunctions (Khalifian et al., 2022; Wheeler et al., 2019) including intimate partner violence (IPV; Spencer et al., 2022). In the present study of 559 partnered male early career air force service members (252 married and 307 nonmarried), 39% reported having experienced at least one ACE before the age of 18. Both childhood abuse and neglectwere significantly correlatedwith symptoms of depression, anxiety, posttraumatic distress, elevated anger, somatic distress, and alcohol misuse. Couple relationship distress and dysfunctional communication patterns were associated with prior childhood emotional or physical abuse but not with childhood neglect or exposure to parental IPV. Prevalence rates of IPV perpetration or victimization were comparable to those reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2023) for the general population. The relative risk ratios of individual or relational dysfunctions in adulthood, given any ACE, ranged from 1.61 to 2.32. These findings are considered for their implications for early identification and intervention with male service members at elevated risk from childhood adversity for a broad spectrum of individual and relationship dysfunctions.