The Australian Child Maltreatment Study is a five-year study to examine the associations between experiences of child maltreatment and mental disorders in the Australian population. It involved participants who were Australian residents aged 16 years and older, and found:

• 62 per cent of Australians aged over 16 report experiencing childhood maltreatment
• 40 per cent reported witnessing domestic violence before the age of 18
• 32 per cent said they'd experienced physical abuse
• 30 per cent reported emotional abuse
• 29 per cent reported experiencing sexual abuse
• 9 per cent said they'd experienced neglect 

This is the most comprehensive assessment of the relationship between childhood maltreatment and mental disorders in Australia to date. It strengthens the case for the integrated services and supports for victim/survivors of child sexual abuse, their families and communities, our petition seeks.

We recently repeated our requests for a meeting with the Victorian Minister of Health, the Victorian Parliamentary Secretary for Health Infrastructure and Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, and the Victorian Minister for Youth Justice. We are also continuing to meet with other advocates and service providers.

"Associations between experiences of child maltreatment and mental disorders were strongest for sexual abuse, emotional abuse and multi-type maltreatment. The strength of the associations did not differ by gender. Adjustment for childhood and current financial hardship and for current socio-economic status did not significantly attenuate the associations.

Sexual abuse was associated with an almost 2-fold increase in the likelihood of PTSD. Sexual abuse was the only form of child maltreatment associated with all three levels of severity of alcohol use disorders. All forms of child maltreatment were similarly associated with mental health harm, although associations were strongest for sexual abuse and emotional abuse. 

Biological changes and psychosocial challenges often experienced by maltreated children are responsible for the increased risk of mental disorders. Child maltreatment leads to cognitive alterations including distrust of others, hypervigilance to threat, impaired emotion recognition and regulation, and reduced responsiveness to rewards. 

Experiences of child maltreatment heighten threat perception, which activates the body’s stress response and sensitises the neurobiological systems, making an individual more vulnerable to mental illness.

Experiences of child maltreatment disrupt emotion recognition and regulation skills, which are critical for healthy relationships with peers and foundational to interpersonal relationships throughout life.

These maladaptive interpersonal problems — for example, the premature sexualisation and shame that accompany sexual abuse — compromise the ability of some maltreated children to form stable friendships, which may lead to persistent relationship challenges over the life course. In this way, child maltreatment initiates a developmental cascade that disrupts social connection and other opportunities, conferring risk of mental disorders.

Australian mental health strategies have failed to integrate the prevention of child maltreatment with other policy initiatives. Whatever the mechanism by which maltreatment is associated with mental disorders, the prevention of harm to children must be a foundation of any mental health policy addressing mental
illness in the population."

"The long-term impacts of child maltreatment were of particular interest to researchers.

Those reporting maltreatment were far more likely to have poorer lifelong health outcomes, including being nearly five times more likely to have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), almost three times as likely to have generalised anxiety disorder and severe alcohol use disorder.

They were also more likely to have obesity or smoke and were six times more likely to be dependent on cannabis.

"That really is a national crisis that we need to do something about," Dr Erskine said."

Professor Mathews, the lead researcher on the study, was a professorial fellow to the Royal Commission Into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. "Child maltreatment in Australia is widespread, it's harmful, and it really needs a nationally coordinated, sustained response," he said."

Thank you to all our Petitioners, we are persisting!