Nina Graf is a doctoral researcher at the Marie Meierhofer Children’s Institute (MMI) in Zurich and a guest researcher at CHESS. Her research focuses on the long-term and intergenerational consequences of early psychosocial deprivation following infant institutionalization. In her doctoral work within the LifeStories project, she investigates whether experiences of institutional care during infancy can have consequences not only across an individual’s life course, but also for the health and well-being of the next generation.
Q: What is your academic background, and what led you to become a researcher in public health?
I studied psychology in Switzerland and the United States, and my academic background is primarily in developmental psychology. I have always been interested how different experiences during childhood and adolescence shape people’s development and later life course.
That interest ultimately led me to my doctoral research at the Marie Meierhofer Children’s Institute, where we view development as a life-long process. Many of the factors I am interested in – for example early-life experiences, social environments, and their long-term consequences for health and well-being – are also highly relevant to public health. What I find particularly interesting is understanding not only how these early experiences affect individuals over time, but also what that might tell us about prevention and how we can support healthier developmental trajectories.
Q: Your doctoral research focuses on the intergenerational consequences of early psychosocial deprivation. What drew you to this topic, and why is it important to understand how experiences very early in life may continue to matter across generations?
The first years of life are a particularly important period of development because early experiences help shape how we understand relationships, safety, and the social world around us. Severe adversity during this period, including the absence of stable and responsive caregiving, can have lasting consequences for development and well-being.
What drew me to this topic was that many of our participants, despite being institutionalized shortly after birth, went on to lead fulfilling lives and have families of their own.
That raised an important question for me: can experiences of severe deprivation very early in life still matter for the next generation? While intergenerational trauma has been studied in contexts such as war, genocide, and the Holocaust, much less is known about the intergenerational consequences of early caregiving deprivation. Understanding this can help us learn more about both long-term vulnerability and resilience across generations.
Q: The LifeStories project follows individuals who were placed in Swiss infant institutions in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and your current research extends this work to their children. What makes this study and its long-term perspective particularly valuable for understanding the consequences of early-life adversity?
What makes the LifeStories project especially valuable is its unusually long-term perspective. We are able to study individuals who experienced severe early-life adversity more than six decades ago and examine how those experiences may relate to their lives much later on.
Their early lives in the institutions are also unusually well documented. Many were placed there only a few days after birth and, on average, experienced less than one hour of interaction with a caregiver within a 24-hour period. The fact that many nevertheless went on to build fulfilling lives makes it possible to study not only long-term consequences, but also potential protective factors and resilience.
By now also including their children, we can extend this perspective across generations and ask which effects may persist, which may diminish over time, and where resilience may interrupt potential intergenerational pathways.
Q: Your research examines several possible pathways through which the effects of early psychosocial deprivation might extend into the next generation. What mechanisms are you particularly interested in, and what might help interrupt or protect against the transmission of disadvantage across generations?
I am particularly interested in three possible pathways: relationships, parenting, and the broader social conditions into which a child is born.
This includes the quality and stability of close relationships, parenting behaviours and the parent-child relationship, but also factors such as the parents’ education, employment, economic situation, and wider social environment. These conditions can shape the opportunities and resources available to a child from the very beginning.
At the same time, I am especially interested in what may interrupt the transmission of disadvantage – for example, supportive relationships, stable family environments, and social or economic resources that may help promote resilience across generations.