For decades, we have understood the impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) on physical and mental health. The more ACEs a person has during childhood relates to higher rates of physical injury, mental health issues, maternal health issues, infectious disease, chronic disease, engagement in risky behaviors, and fewer educational, occupational, and financial opportunities later in life. One item on the original ACEs study that remains in later versions is the event of parental divorce during childhood. The impact of divorce on children is real and long lasting. However, some interventions have been developed to bolster resilience in children and families going through divorce. Iowa Center for Children’s Justice aims to help mitigate the harm inflicted by contentious divorce proceedings by providing legal representation to children, facilitating mediation, and conducting workshops for children experiencing divorce.
Kaiser Permanente conducted the original ACEs study by utilizing data from over 17,000 people from 1995 to 1997. The results showed a positive relationship between the number of ACEs and the prevalence of adverse long-term outcomes. Basically, the more ACEs a person experienced, the more chance that person had of experiencing poor health later in life. However, the troubling impacts of ACEs is not a guarantee for a terrible life. Resilience has been shown to be a mitigating factor fighting against the long-lasting effects of ACEs.
Resilience is known as the capacity of an individual, family, or community to recover from adversity. Resiliency can be an innate part of someone’s personality, but it can also be built and fostered. One way to foster resiliency is to intervene during an adverse experience. The approach to intervention of course depends on the type of experience and the individual experiencing it.
While divorce is only one of the items on the questionnaire, it is very prevalent today. Iowa Center for Children’s Justice served roughly 2100 youth in 2019 through legal representation. The youth served by this intervention often experience additional ACEs including poverty, domestic violence, child abuse, and mental health issues. This intervention aims to build resilience by giving children a voice in the court proceedings. Emerging research has shown this type of intervention to be important and influential in helping children to navigate a difficult situation. By giving children a voice and allowing that voice to be heard in legal proceedings, a sense of self-efficacy and autonomy is fostered. Children could feel helpless or as though things beyond their control are happening to them. When given a voice, these children may feel as though they are more respected as important members of the family, and more in control of their choices. Research has shown that while most children accept that not all their wishes are granted, being heard throughout the process helps them feel less hopeless.
Iowa Center for Children’s Justice also serves children and families by providing educational workshops for children experiencing divorce. While these workshops have recently been put on hold during the Covid-19 pandemic, they previously served roughly 800 youth per year. Every child going through divorce in the Polk County, Iowa was mandated to attend these types of workshops. Iowa Center for Children’s Justice serves Polk County including the Des Moines metro area. These workshops aim to offer education, peer support, and coping skills to children facing family transitions related to divorce. These interventions such as coping skill development have also been shown to build resilience and mitigate the impact of ACEs.
The latest addition to Iowa Center for Children’s Justice’s toolbox is child-focused mediation. This intervention is used as an alternative to court in custody cases in which families can find solutions without court involvement.
My work with ICCJ through Future Leaders in Action is to develop clear, consistent metrics to measure the impact of these various interventions. ICCJ, as a newer organization, and as a non-profit agency, needs ways to prove to government agencies and funders that the work they are doing has an impact, and that they are doing it well. I am working to create client surveys for children and parents involved in each of the different intervention services. These surveys will measure family conflict, children’s sense of autonomy and self-efficacy, and the use of coping skills. Additionally, I am working to develop a survey for involved Polk County family court judges. This survey will rate how the judges feel ICCJ’s services are helping the court proceedings and impacting judicial decisions.
For more information on ACEs visit the CDC by clicking here or visit Iowa ACEs 360. To take the ACEs test for yourself click here.
For more information on children and families dealing with divorce check out these articles on cultivating resilience, resilience, survival, and vulnerability and children's views on divorce.
To learn more about ICCJ and their services check out their website.
For more about Future Leaders in Action and this author click here.