The Impact of Trauma Exposure on Addictive Behaviors: A Study Among Youth Populations

Introduction: Early experiences of abuse, neglect, parental conflict, a parent's addiction to substances, or conditions of relational and emotional instability can impair the normal development of emotional self-regulation. If not processed, this fragility can lead to a resort to dysfunctional coping strategies, including substance abuse, problematic alcohol use, and behavioral dependence on the Internet or other compensatory stimuli.

Method: The current study used a convenience sampling method and recruited 50 young adult participants (18-30 years old) who completed Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE), Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT), Drug Use Disorders Identification Test (DUDIT), Internet Addiction Test (IAT), and The Love Addiction Inventory (LAI) and Yale Food Addiction Scale (YFAS).

Results: Person Correlation analyses showed significant links between adverse childhood experiences and various forms of substance use: alcohol (r=0.38, p=0.0078), drug use (r=0.54, p<0.0001), and food addiction (r=0.35, p=0.0124). Additionally, food addiction showed a strong correlation with internet addiction (r=0.48, p=0.0004) and love addiction (r=0.30, p=0.037). However, no significant associations were found between Internet or love addiction and substance use. These patterns suggest that there are distinct clusters between substance-related and behavioral dependencies.

Discussion: Findings indicate that early adverse experiences are more closely linked to substance-related and food-related dependencies, suggesting a compensatory function for unprocessed emotional dysregulation. Behavioral addictions such as Internet and Love addiction appear to operate through different psychological mechanisms, possibly linked to unmet relational needs rather than trauma-related self-regulation deficits. Gender differences also emerged: males were more likely to struggle with substance-related dependencies, while females showed a higher prevalence of behavioral addictions. These differences suggest that gender might play a role in how individuals choose to cope with their emotional challenges.