Adverse Childhood Experiences (Child and Adolescent)

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs)—including abuse, neglect, household dysfunction, and early food insecurity—shape stress physiology, reward pathways, and emotion regulation in ways that influence lifelong eating patterns, diet quality, obesity risk, and maladaptive eating behaviors such as binge eating and ultra-processed food overconsumption.

Within nutritional psychology, this category examines how early-life trauma interacts with biological stress systems, psychosocial factors, and the food environment to impact food choices, appetite, body weight, and food security across the lifespan, and explores trauma-informed, diet-related interventions that may support mental health and resilience.