A traumatic life experience in childhood increases the risk of a psychiatric disorder in the offspring.

A traumatic life experience in childhood is a fundamental risk factor of numerous psychiatric disorders. Recently, studies try to evaluate the mental health consequences on victims' offspring, but few psychiatric disorders were examined, and whether these results apply to the general population remains unknown. In this study, we use the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions, a large representative sample of American population, in order to estimate the impact on the offspring of a traumatic experience in parents. Besides, we use a well-known risk factor for offspring's psychiatric disorder: a familial history of a psychiatric disorder, in order to compare and assess the importance of parental traumatism as a risk factor for the offspring. Our results show that the five psychiatric disorders studied, alcohol use disorder, substance use disorder, mood disorder, antisocial personality disorder and anxiety disorder, are more prevalent in the offspring, when at least one parent report a traumatic life event in his own childhood. Moreover, the magnitude of this risk factor is close to the magnitude of having a parental history of psychiatric disorder.