These results must be interpreted in the context of study limitations. First, since retrospective reports may underestimate reports of TEs, especially those encountered early in life (Fergusson et al. 2000; Hardt & Rutter, 2004) and emotionally charged (Depue et al. 2007), some recall bias is inevitable. A review of the literature on the validity of retrospective reports of childhood abuse indicates that false negatives are common and false positives are rare (Hardt & Rutter, 2004), suggesting that our estimates are likely to be conservative. One would expect this to be true for other stigmatizing events as well.
