What is an adverse childhood experience

Linda Bignell
Nov 22
2 min read

Adverse childhood experiences, often called ACEs, are stressful or harmful events that happen before age eighteen. They can include things like emotional neglect, physical abuse, exposure to addiction, domestic violence, or losing a parent. These experiences can shape how someone copes with stress, forms relationships and handles emotions later in life. Not everyone who has ACEs struggles as an adult, but they can raise the risk of mental health challenges, chronic illness, substance use and difficulty regulating emotions.

When people ask “what is an adverse childhood experience,” they're usually trying to understand why certain patterns follow them into adulthood. Learning about ACEs isn’t about blame, it’s about understanding how past experiences can shape behaviour, and how healing and support can still happen later.

Adverse childhood experience list

Professionals often refer to a core list of ten ACEs, grouped into three areas:

Abuse

Physical abuse
Emotional abuse
Sexual abuse

Neglect

Physical neglect
Emotional neglect

Household challenges

Substance abuse in the home
Mental illness in the home
Incarceration of a household member
Domestic violence
Parental separation, abandonment or divorce

These aren’t the only difficult experiences a child can face, but they’re the ones defined in the original research and used in most assessments.

Adverse childhood experience quiz

Many people use the adverse childhood experience quiz to understand their past and how it affects them today. The quiz gives a score based on how many ACEs you experienced. The number itself isn't a diagnosis. It’s a starting point for reflection and sometimes a helpful tool to begin therapy conversations.

If you're curious, look for versions based on the adverse childhood experience study, not random internet quizzes that add extra items for clicks.

ACE test adverse childhood experience

The ACE test usually asks ten yes-or-no questions. You get one point for each experience that applies to you. A higher score suggests a higher risk of long-term effects like anxiety, chronic stress or substance use. If you do take the test, do it somewhere you feel safe, and consider talking to a therapist afterward if it brings up unexpected emotions.

The adverse childhood experience study

The original ACE study followed thousands of people to see how childhood stress affects health long-term. It found that repeated or chronic emotional stress can shape the nervous system, immune function and behaviour patterns well into adult life. This research helped shift mental health conversations from “what’s wrong with you?” to “what happened to you?” which is a more compassionate and accurate frame.