# Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma in WTC Responders with PTSD

> **NIH ALLCDC U01** · NEW YORK STATE PSYCHIATRIC INSTITUTE DBA RESEARCH FOUNDATION FOR MENTAL HYGIENE, INC · 2020 · $499,995

## Abstract

A parent’s experience of trauma has been shown to impact the psychological well-being of their children even
when the children themselves were not directly exposed to the traumatic event. Research on the
Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma (ITT) has demonstrated behavioral, cognitive, and emotional
difficulties in offspring of traumatized parents, including hypervigilance, nightmares, difficulties in interpersonal
functioning, and deficits in academic performance, along with mood and other psychiatric disorders. Studies
examining the effects of trauma transmission from parents with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD),
reported high rates of PTSD in their offspring. However, there is still debate regarding the proposed pathways
of ITT explaining the increased risk for impaired psychological well-being in children of parents exposed to
trauma. The burden of ITT has not received appropriate research consideration in children of World Trade
Center Responders (WTC-R) given earlier reports of behavioral, psychological and health problems among
these children, and evidence suggests that these difficulties and disorders will persist beyond the childhood
years. This proposal aims to address this gap by establishing a new cohort of persons who were younger than
18 years of age at the time of the 9/11 terror attack, and whose parents developed PTSD after being exposed
through their occupation to the terror attack and its aftermath. We will: a) assess the psychological well-being
and risk factors of this cohort using an online battery of cognitive and emotional tasks and psychological
instruments; and b) integrate data from the parent cohort with that collected on this new cohort to examine the
possible mediators of ITT. Understanding ITT is a necessary prerequisite for formulating effective public health
interventions after mass disasters.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10064865
- **Project number:** 1U01OH012065-01
- **Recipient organization:** NEW YORK STATE PSYCHIATRIC INSTITUTE DBA RESEARCH FOUNDATION FOR MENTAL HYGIENE, INC
- **Principal Investigator:** KEELY R CHESLACK-POSTAVA
- **Activity code:** U01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** ALLCDC
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $499,995
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2020-07-01 → 2021-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10064865

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10064865, Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma in WTC Responders with PTSD (1U01OH012065-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10064865. Licensed CC0.

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