Who Hurts the Most Around the World?
Where you live might determine how much you hurt: people in Egypt are more than twice as likely to report being in pain as those in Israel.
A cross-national analysis of childhood predictors of physical pain
Adverse childhood experiences, such as parental divorce, family financial hardship, abuse, and poor health, are linked to a greater risk of experiencing physical pain in adulthood.
The strength of the connection between childhood circumstances and adult physical pain varies significantly across different countries and cultures.
More frequent religious service attendance at age 12 was associated with a greater risk of experiencing physical pain later in life.
Physical pain is one of the world's biggest public health challenges, affecting quality of life and costing economies billions. This research changes how we should think about tackling it. It suggests that preventing adult pain isn't just about medicine or lifestyle choices in adulthood; it starts with protecting children.
“The fight against chronic pain begins not in the doctor's office, but in policies that create stable and nurturing childhoods.”
By identifying childhood instability, poverty, and abuse as major risk factors, the findings provide a clear mandate for public policy. Investing in programs that create safe, stable, and nurturing environments for children—such as family support services, financial aid, and abuse prevention initiatives—is a form of long-term public health. It's a strategy for preventing suffering before it begins. For individuals, this knowledge can be empowering. It validates the deep connection between emotional and physical well-being, encouraging a more holistic approach to health that addresses the wounds of the past, not just the symptoms of the present.
“The fight against chronic pain begins not in the doctor's office, but in policies that create stable and nurturing childhoods.”
Does our childhood shape the physical pain we feel as adults? To find out, researchers analyzed data from over 200,000 people across 22 countries, asking them about their current level of bodily pain and about 13 different experiences from their childhood. The findings reveal a powerful connection between early life and later-life pain.
“The aches and pains we feel as adults can be echoes of childhood stress, our bodies carrying the memory of early hardship.”
Adults who faced significant challenges as children were more likely to experience physical pain decades later. This included people whose parents had divorced or died, those who grew up in families with severe financial struggles, those who felt like an outsider in their own family, and especially those who had been physically or sexually abused. For example, adults who experienced abuse in childhood had a 25% higher risk of reporting significant pain compared to those who did not. Even a child's own health mattered: those who reported being in poor health growing up were more likely to be in pain as adults.
Surprisingly, attending religious services more frequently at age 12 was also linked to more adult pain. Researchers think this might be because children who were already suffering sought comfort in religion, not that religion itself caused the pain. This study shows that our bodies can carry the memory of early hardship. The aches and pains we might dismiss as just part of life could be echoes of childhood stress, telling a story about our entire life journey, not just our current physical condition.
Adults who experienced physical or sexual abuse during childhood had a 25% greater risk of experiencing physical pain compared to those who were not abused.
Adults who reported having poor physical health while growing up had a 1.2 times greater risk of experiencing pain compared to those with good childhood health.
People who felt like an outsider in their family while growing up had a 16% greater risk of experiencing physical pain in adulthood.
Individuals who grew up with a single, never-married parent had a 1.11 times greater risk of experiencing physical pain in adulthood compared to those whose parents were married.
Macchia, L., Okafor, C. N., Breedlove, T., Shiba, K., Piper, A., Johnson, B., & VanderWeele, T. J. (2025). A cross-national analysis of childhood predictors of physical pain. Communications Medicine, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43856-025-00997-2
Where you live might determine how much you hurt: people in Egypt are more than twice as likely to report being in pain as those in Israel.
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