Effects of trauma exposure and posttraumatic stress disorder on perceived social support in youth: A longitudinal investigation

The aim of this study was to examine relationships among trauma burden, post-traumatic stress disorder, and perceived social support in a large, diverse group of trauma-exposed children and adolescents followed longitudinally. Specifically, we tested the social erosion hypothesis (i.e., mental health challenges negatively affect the quality of social relationships and contribute to reduced social support over time) using a sample of 1,829 trauma-exposed youth (aged 8–21) recruited through the multi-site Texas Childhood Trauma Research Network. Youth who reported more trauma burden (i.e., a greater number of traumas) perceived significantly lower levels of social support from family and peers, and those with more interpersonal trauma perceived significantly lower levels of social support from all sources, after controlling for multiple demographic variables and psychiatric comorbidities. Notably, the negative associations between trauma and perceived social support were most prominent among individuals without a PTSD diagnosis. Trauma burden was not associated with declines in perceived social support over a 12-month period. Additionally, in these trauma-exposed youth, being assigned female at birth was positively associated with perceived support from family members and negatively associated with perceived social support from a close friend. These findings extend our understanding of how trauma and PTSD independently predict and interact to predict perceived social support.