the assignment

• hypothesis

  Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES) is the most significant cause of crime affecting crime rates
• aims

  • what percentage of current Scottish prisoners have an adverse childhood experience, and which is most common?

  • how does the childhood experience link to the crime a perpetrator commits?

  • how would preventing ACEs impact crime rates?
• One source I have found is through internet research - an infographic published by the Scottish Government. This is a strong source as it is reliable, and it is written by an expert. It was written in May 2018, making it partially recent and and up to date. One improvement I would make is for it to be updated, if there is any additional information. However, it is incredibly detailed and provides statistics on how ACES link to crime, annotated images on things such as the several types of ACES, and covers a variety of subtopics with relevant knowledge on Adverse Childhood Experiences.
• Another source I have found is a newspaper article written by the Guardian - (name article). this is a good source as the author, a worker who often engages in charity and psychological work with children, is an expert. However, this may make the author bias. It uses emotive and persuasive language and contains background and health information on ACES, but could have been significantly more detailed. Another limitation I found was that a substantial portion of this article was on the author’s own charity. If i were to repeat this assignment, i would choose a more factual article.
• A third source I have found is a newspaper article written by Owen Clarke, a BBC Wales Health Correspondent - (name article) This was a useful source as the author, Owen Clarke is an expert on health. This was written in November 2016. I believe this could be rewritten with further information, but is still relevant and published within the same decade. It gives quotes and statistics regarding ACEs, specifically in Wales.
• Source 3 limitation

  One limitation I found was that the article is mostly centred on how ACEs affect later health, opposed to later behaviour and crime. If I were to do this assignment again, I would want to find an article with a more specific focal point to my topic.
• Research findings first aim

  • A first finding from the ACEs Scottish Government infographic was that being incarcerated is significantly more likely if you are a victim of an ACE, and a surprising number of Scottish prisoners have admitted to experiencing at least one ACE in childhood.
  • A second finding was from the newspaper article written by a BBC Wales Health Correspondent, which said that Verbal Abuse is the most commonly experienced ACE across Welsh adults
• Research findings for second aim

  • Another finding I discovered from the Scottish Government infographic on ACEs was that a traumatic childhood links to crime as it disrupts healthy brain development 
  • A fourth finding I discovered was from the Article written by The Guardian on neglectful homes, which said that children exposed to serious abuse are more likely to engage in domestic violence, which is a common childhood link for perpetrators 
• Research findings third aim

  • An additional finding I discovered was from the infographic on ACEs written by the Scottish Government, which said that there are many protective factors that could be taken against offending, such as children having a trusted adult and social connections. This would lower the chances of ACEs leading to crime.
  • A final finding I discovered from the Scottish Government infographic on ACEs is that preventing and correctly responding to ACEs could have a significant impact on Scottish Crime Rates.
• I found that a large percentage of current UK prisoners have admitted to experiencing at least one ACE. My first source, the Scottish Government infographic, showed that 45% of adult prisoner survey respondents reported that they had been physically abused in their home as a child. Additionally, 61% of adult prisoner survey respondents had been bullied at school or somewhere else. This shows that ACEs have a substantial impact on the current Scottish prison population, as more have experienced at least one ACE than not, which inevitably affected the crime they committed and why.
• First conclusion explanation

  This might be because experiencing 4+ Adverse Childhood Experiences makes you 15x more likely to become a perpetrator of crime and 20x more likely to become incarcerated (put in jail).
• I also found that preventing ACEs could be a significant opportunity to reduce crime in Scotland. This is because some studies have estimated that preventing ACEs could halve violence perpetuation and incarceration. This shows that ACEs cause a great impact in crime rates, and if properly dealt with they could be largely positively affected. This might be because the continued exposure to ACEs can affect healthy brain development and manifest in risk-taking and criminal behaviour.
• I found my hypothesis to be accurate overall as Adverse Childhood Experiences are still a major issue that have an enormous impact on crime rates and the Scottish prison population, even though not every person that experiences an ACE goes on to commit crime, and not every criminal has experienced an ACE. I would recommend introducing more parenting and school-based programmes to tackle and inform people of the dangers of experiencing an Adverse Childhood Experience, and to focus on building resilience in and protecting children.