Spanking And Its Effect On Children

Spanking is subjective in the least. Most parents suggest that using spankings as a form of discipline is essential to the development of a compliant child. For most Americans, this truth is one of the core foundations of the American model home. “70% of mothers indicated they had spanked their child at least once by the time he or she was 2-years-old” (Lee, Altschul and Gershoff, 2015.) There are numerous amounts of evidence that point to the certainty that spanking is linked to child aggression. In,

The diversity in ethnicities and cultures throughout the world is extreme. These cultures come with different visions in disciplinary action whether it seems logical or not in other points of views. The world has different perspectives and different people to back up their reasons behind the actions taken. The main controversy that has been taken on for years in several parts of the world is the debate of whether or not spanking, as a disciplinary action for children when they are misbehaving. As expressed in these three articles: “Today’s Child Abuse Creates Tomorrow’s Criminals” by Chandre Gould, “The Overwhelming Evidence Against Spanking” by Meghan Leahy, and “Disciplinary Spanking is Not Child Abuse” by Okey, Chigbo; there are severa pros and cons to an action such as spanking. This specific disciplinary action can affect the life of a human being for either a short term and long term effect.

They believe the studies that prove spanking can be helpful, think spanking is not always wrong, or believe that harmful effects could be caused by personality differences. Marjorie Gunnoe, a psychology professor, did a study that found that people who could recall being spanked as a child had performed better in school and showed more optimistic qualities than people who were not spanked. The research completely contradicted the studies that showed spanking to be harmful. (3) Some experts take note that 50 years ago the majority of children were spanked by their parents and today there is a significant decline in the amount of children being spanked; but today more children are shown to be aggressive than in the past. There is also a possibility that the “bad effects” in spanked children could have been caused by the child’s personality or the behavioral differences that warranted the spankings. (4)

Spanking has been a culturally accepted form of punishment for children between the ages of one to five until recently due to belief that it may cause more aggressive behavior. Parents have turned to a warmth parenting style, which includes “affection, comfort, concern, nurturance, support, and good old fashioned love (Lee, Altschul, and Gershoff, p. #2018)”. In this study, reseachers look at whether spanking has a negative impact on children’s development, and if they develop aggressive behaviors. Two questions remain: “Are spanking and maternal warmth independently associated with changes in child aggression over time? And does maternal warmth moderate the extent to which increases in maternal spanking predict increases in child aggression over time (Lee,

Lansford et al. (2012) used an experiment that was done beginning in 1987 called the Child Development Project in which 585 families with children going into kindergarten participated. In this experiment, mothers filled out questionnaires when their children were 6, 7, and 8 regarding frequency and severity of spanking and amount of externalizing behavior. The children's teachers also filled out a questionnaire regarding amount of externalizing behavior. Mothers were asked to rate the frequency that they spanked their child with their hand and the frequency that they spanked their child with an object on a scale of 0 to 4 with 0 meaning never, 1 meaning less than once a month, 2 meaning about once a month, 3 meaning about once a week, and 4 meaning about every day. Mothers also completed the Child Behavior Checklist which asked them to rate whether statements, such as "argues a lot," were very true or not true of their child (Lansford et al., 2012, p. 228). Teachers were asked to fill out the Teacher Report Form which consisted of the same format and similar statements to the Child Behavior Checklist.

15% of children are spanked before their first birthday, also 19 states in the U.S. allow spanking in schools. Spanking can cause aggression, mental disorders, and drug/alcohol abuse during adulthood (Online Psychology). Does spanking effect kids or effect how they act, does spanking effect later discipline techniques? Is it considered child abuse? Multiple questions on whether spanking should even be aloud.

Spanking or inflicting a child may cause aggression in children. Spanking at the ages 10 months and 5 years is common in 70% of American family’s although according some researchers that corporal punishment can affect the ability to function and acceptance of values. Spanking at an early age can do more harm than good. Studies show that children who gets spanked are more likely to get violent in adult hood. Most children develop between the age of 3 months and 5 years old if corporal punishment action is used it can make the child less aware and can cause problem in education for teachers and authority.

Based on the many of the online articles and journals from different academic sources like the oxford journal, the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences I have read personally, I am confident that the damaging effects of spanking outweigh the positives. 4. I’ll be covering how Spanking children should be against the law in the USA because of the harmful effects it has on a child’s development, self-image, and there are better

Fréchette, Sabrina, Michael Zoratti, and Elisa Romano. "What Is the Link Between Corporal Punishment and Child Physical Abuse?" SpringerLink. Springer US, 25 Jan. 2015. Web. 05 Apr. 2017. . This article was very statistical because they survey individuals about spanking. About the difference between spanking and child physical abuse and what they would consider spanking and to what extent. They also examined parenting and family factors that could distinguish why they spank their children. An if spanking can occur with or without physical abuse. They also examined if spanking was a form of punishment that each generation of their family would do.

Can spanking, be harmful to children? The ethics and cultural influences affect the use of spanking as a punishment. Spanking is controversial because it can be viewed as corporal punishment that can have a negative affect on children. Others believe that it is a moral act to use with no detrimental effects. Spanking is sometimes considered corporal punishment and is used to alter an undesirable behavior without physically injuring the child.

Spanking has several effects on the children, which build numerous opinions among the people. Researchers have shown many positive and negative sides of physical punishment. There are several people that agree with spanking their children and there are others who are against punishing the children. Many of the parents who spank their children believe that spanking is sometimes acceptable because they believe it will make a positive effect on their behavior. Spanking is used to correct children’s behavior, but, many people feel that instead of bettering the child’s behavior, it makes it worse. Spanking has been an enormous issue in the past decades. Many children have been physically abused and many others have never experienced any

The popular news article I selected was by Dr. Laura Markham (2017) on a website called AhaParenting titled, “Should You Spank Your Child?”. The claims made in the article cover that parents who were spanked as a child are more likely to spank their own children, that kids who are spanked are less emotionally healthy than kids who weren’t, and other factors involving corporal punishment both long lasting and immediate. The proposed message of the article is that spanking produces unruly behavior and has no evidence of any positive behavioral changes.

S. Lee, J. Manganello, J. Rice, C. Taylor (2010) preformed a study to understand childhood aggression. The journal article of Mothers’ Spanking of 3-Year-Old Children and Subsequent Risk of Children’s Aggressive Behavior starts by saying that they are not the first to perform this research and many of studies have displayed connection between corporal punishment with children and child aggression. They are testing their research with new controlling factors, which have not been controlled together before. (Lee et al., 2010) The main goal of the article is to determine the association between the use of corporal punishment against 3-year-old children and recognize later aggressive behavior among those children.

Parents should not spank their children because the parental spanking of children can be harmful to the behavioral and social development of their children. Parental spanking of children is a violent disciplinary technique where a parent hits children's behinds with an open hand or object in order to deter children's' behavior in a way the parents may perceive as negative. I grew up in a home where my parents spanked me and my three younger brothers. I have witnessed parental spanking of children practiced first hand. I have found that the parental spanking of children does not work as well as a lot of parents think it does. Whether a parent, teacher, or social worker, the parental spanking of children is important to have an empirically

The authors also identify the known effects of spanking on childhood outcomes. They noted that most of the literature has been concerned with aggressive child outcomes, such as increased child stress reactivity (Bugenthal, Martorell, and Barraza, 2003). They also noted that studies are emerging on the connection between spanking and child cognitive outcomes. (Gershoff, 2010). They criticize these emerging works as suffering from a lack of "…adequate controls for the predictors of spanking, risk factors which themselves could be