Cognitive, Neurobiological and Psychopathological Alterations Associated with Child Maltreatment: A Review of Systematic Reviews

Abstract

The impact of childhood maltreatment has been studied in the last decades in several countries. This study aims to provide a review of systematic reviews about the relationship between neurobiological and cognitive impairments, psychiatric disorders and child maltreatment. PsycInfo, Pubmed and Scielo databases were searched to include reviews published from 2004 to 2014. Fifteen reviews about the impact of child maltreatment were analysed. Four of them deal with the neurobiological effects, two with the cognitive damages, and nine of them with the development of psychiatric disorders throughout the victim’s lifetime. The association between childhood maltreatment and the development of psychiatric disorders is the one that has received the most attention in the last few decades. The impact of maltreatment in cognition, above all in childhood, has been the least studied area; few studies, presenting conflicting results, were found.