Ariel Winter has revealed that her self-esteem was left "totally damaged" after her years of child stardom.

The 27-year-old actress starred as Alex Dunphy on the sitcom Modern Family throughout her teenage years and became a "target" of hate and struggled to accept herself at that time.

She told PEOPLE: “It was every headline I read about myself, like, grown people writing articles about me saying how I looked terrible or pregnant or like a fat slut. I mean, I was 14,” Winter said.

“It totally damaged my self-esteem. No matter what I was going through, I was a target. It made it very difficult to look at myself in the mirror and go, 'I love this version of me.'"

Winter has always maintained that her mother Chrisoula Workman was abusive towards her, and while Workman has always publicly denied those allegations, the actress ended up living in the care of her older sister Shanelle Gray but insisted that she still has a "really deep, painful sore" when she looks back on her childhood.

Winter said: "I went on to have a great rest of my teenage years thanks to being under her custody.

"Honestly, (my biggest source of trauma) is just my entire childhood. It's a really deep, painful, sore, sore part for me that's so much deeper and bigger than I've ever felt ready to talk about."

Winter insisted that she "didn't leave the industry, just that she had to leave Hollywood because of the difficult "memories" she associated with the area.

She said: "I didn't leave the industry. I just left the city of L.A. It holds some not-great memories for me, and I'm young and never lived anywhere else, and thought, 'Why not?' If you're no longer on a network show that shoots there, you don't really have to be there, and if I get a network show, I can easily go back."

With AAP.