The Adverse Digital Childhood Experiences (ADCEs) Framework: A Transformative Paradigm for Decoding Digital Adversity and Safeguarding Human Agency in Child Development and Lifespan Trajectories

Abstract

Childhood is no longer confined to physical spaces; It increasingly unfolds within digitally saturated environments where algorithmically mediated technologies shape attention, learning, and identity formation from the earliest years. Traditional adversity frameworks, particularly the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) model, do not capture the distinctive, persistent, and often invisible risks of digital life. To address this gap, this study advances the Adverse Digital Childhood Experiences (ADCEs) framework, an empirically informed and theory-driven extension of ACEs that systematizes ten interrelated domains of digital adversity encompassing social, cognitive, and environmental stressors. These include cyberbullying and exploitation, commercial surveillance and privacy harms, technoference and digital neglect, identity distortion, exposure to harmful content, ideological manipulation, and displacement of physical play and nature engagement. Developed through an integrative synthesis of multidisciplinary evidence, the ADCEs framework delineates mechanisms through which digital and AI-mediated systems may influence neurocognitive, socioemotional, and ethical development. A structured research and clinical rubric is proposed to support psychometric validation, longitudinal tracking, and cross-cultural adaptation. By integrating developmental science, digital ethics, and public health, the ADCEs framework provides a coherent scaffold for research, screening, and intervention, enabling policymakers, educators, and clinicians to safeguard children’s well-being and agency across convergent physical–digital ecologies.