Family difficulties, bullying at school (yes, it starts earlier and earlier) and stressful situations of all kinds are the cause of premature aging in the person who has experienced these traumas. In question ? Shrinkage of telomeres (pieces of DNA protecting the end of chromosomes) indicating cellular aging.
To carry out this work, scientists at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver called on 46,000 people, men and women, over the age of 50. The subjects of the study had to complete questionnaires on the more or less serious experiences with which they were confronted in their childhood:repeating a year, money problems, parent(s) unemployed, sexual abuse, violence... More than half of participants had dealt with difficult situations during childhood and about a quarter of them had suffered serious trauma.
Result:stress does have an impact on telomere shrinkage and therefore on aging in adulthood. Indeed, people who have experienced stressful events in their childhood are more likely to lose their telomeres in length (about 11% per traumatic event). On the other hand, the researchers noted that stress due to social and psychological difficulties had a greater impact on telomere shortening than financial worries. Come on, let's relax and take care of our children!
