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Spanking and its effects
Corporal punishment effects on children
Spanking and its effects
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From the earliest practice, in Ancient Greece, physical discipline or spanking has been endorsed as the superior method for disciplining children. From then on spanking came to be a very common method of discipline all over the world. Even to this day spanking is a very common practice. In fact two thirds of Americans approve of spanking to this day. Although, spanking or physical discipline in America has declined progressively over the years because parents are now more aware of the negative effects spanking has on children. A childs’ behavior is altered negatively rather than positively when they are disciplined physically through spanking.
Honestly, spanking is the quickest and fastest way to challenge a misbehaved child’s behavior. It may even allow guardian to stop that specific problem in a child’s behavior before it gets out of hand. According to psychologist Dr. James Dobson “… when the child fully understand what he is being asked to do or not to do but refuses to yield to adult leadership an appropriate spanking is the shortest and most affective route to an adjustment….”. Spanking is most affective when a child fully comprehends why their poor behavioral decisions are inadequate compared to what is expected of them. Although, spanking may be a quick solution it is only a temporary solution. Spanking may stop a child from misbehaving on a certain occasion, but a child will return to its misbehaving manners because they were focusing in on their hurtful punishment rather than learning from their poor decision. Author of many child discipline books, Carl Pickhardt, states “…. spanking is a temporary solution that does more harm than good. It "works" because it's external control over a child, but it doesn't promote i...
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"History of Spanking." Arms of Love Family Fellowship. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Jan. 2014. .
Smith, Anne B. "The State of Research on the Effects of Physical Punishment." Ministry of Social Development. Ministry of Social Development, n.d. Web. 30 Jan. 2014. .
Smith, Brendan L. "The Case Against Spanking." American Psychological Association. American Psychological Association, Apr. 2012. Web. 30 Jan. 2014. .
Swat! The entire store tries not to stare at the overwhelmed mother spanking her three-year-old whaling son. As if the screaming tantrum wasn't enough of a side show at the supermarket. This method, or technique perhaps, has been around for decades, even centuries. Generations have sat on grandpa’s lap and listened to the stories of picking their own switch or getting the belt after pulling off a devilish trick. So why then has it become a major controversy in the past few decades? The newest claim is that spanking and other forms of physical punishment can lead to increased aggression, antisocial behavior, physical injury and mental health problems for children. Brendan L. Smith uses many case studies and psychologists findings in his article “The Case Against Spanking” to suggest that parents refrain from physically punishing their children due to lasting harmful effects.
Darcia begins her writing by first defining spanking as “hitting a child on the bottom with an open hand.” She then illustrates situations in which many parents may warrant the need for spanking. She follows with multiple examples of the negative effects of corporal punishment on the developing children ranging from increased aggression in retaliation to lack of trust
Spanking doesn’t allow children to learn the reasons why to act appropriately. When parents use physical punishment, such as spanking, to discipline their children, they do so in order to improve their child’s behavior. According to a report composed by a lead researcher in the field of pediatrics, spanking does not teach children the reason for why they are being punished or why their behavior was wrong. Spanking teaches children to act in a desired way only because of fear of being punished. Being a victim of spanking, I only feared the idea of being spanked, and that is why I changed my behavior for the time being. I did not actually understand the reasoning for why I was being punished. Spanked children do not understand the positive and important reasons for acting properly.
Spanking is an important aspect of a child’s social development and should not be considered an evil form of abuse. In her argument, Debra Saunders says that there is an obvious difference between beating a child and spanking a child, and parents know the boundary. Spanking is the most effective form of discipline when a child knows doing something is wrong, but the child does it anyway. A child who is properly disciplined through spanking is being taught how to control her or his impulses and how to deal with all types of authorities in future environments. Parents can control their child’s future behavior by using spanking in early childhood, because if...
The question of whether to spank or not has been the most controversial child-rearing issue of the past three decades. Though no end in sight, after analyzing my research of the extremes of spanking, I conclude in the gray area. John Rosemond proved the most logical approach to spanking. He has studied both sides of the issues and points out the inconsistencies of each side. Rosemond supports his point of view with grounds of disagreement and agreement and fills gaps the gap of the gray area connecting the opposing sides.
Hyman, Irwin A. The Case Against Spanking: How to Discipline Your Children Without Hitting. San Fransico: Jossey-Bass, 1997. Print.
Nonetheless, considers spanking an outcome with dysfunctional mental and physical health issues that roots from often harsh spankings (Kazdin and Benjet, 2003). If parents were set to believe corporal punishment leads to the development of mental issues or physical aggression with peers solving conflicts (Taylor et al.,2016). If the world knew what corporal punishment actually does parents would seek a different approach. Most parents think the views of their children is a reflection of how they are being raised, which supports why this article argument is stronger. Another reason this article is stronger argument is because of how severe the logical fallacies are with in “Spanking and Children’s Externalizing Behavior Across the First Decade of Life:” Even so, the article did provide some strong points as well by recognizing the limitations the studies bring with parents by relying on their responses to general questions about spanking.
Harvard Medical School . "The Spanking Debate." Harvard Mental Health Letter (2002): 1-3. Academic Search Premier. Web. 23 April 2011.
[2] DILLER, LAWRENCE. "The Truth About Spanking." National Review 60.7 (2008): 42-44. Academic Search Complete. Web. 29 Nov. 2013.
Finally, we need to know more about the personal resources of parents that can lessen the incidence of spanking. It is found that spanking sharply decreases as the parent ages. Despite ideological motivations, parents can and should be trained to understand alternative strategies of discipline (Day 93).
The use of spanking is one of the most controversial parenting practices and also one of the oldest, spanning throughout many generations. Spanking is a discipline method in which a supervising adult deliberately inflicts pain upon a child in response to a child’s unacceptable behaviour. Although spanking exists in nearly every country and family, its expression is heterogeneous. First of all the act of administering a spanking varies between families and cultures. As Gershoff (2002) pointed out, some parents plan when a spanking would be the most effective discipline whereas some parents spank impulsively (Holden, 2002). Parents also differ in their moods when delivering this controversial punishment, some parents are livid and others try and be loving and reason with the child. Another source of variation is the fact that spanking is often paired with other parenting behaviours such as, scolding, yelling, or perhaps raging and subsequently reasoning. A third source of variation concerns parental characteristics. Darling and Steinberg (1993) distinguished between the content of parental acts and the style in which it was administered (Holden, 2002). With all this variation researchers cannot definitively isolate the singular effects of spanking.
The issue of spanking is whether it is justifiable or an act of child abuse. Some child specialists, such as Christine Walsh and Michael Boyle, argue that if a parent must administer a spanking, it should not be through anger and only as a last option when other forms of discipline have been deemed unsuccessful. They say that for a spanking to be instructive it must be...
Smith, B. L. (2012). The case against spanking. American Psychological Association, 43(4), 60. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/04/spanking.aspx
I personally do not advocate spanking. I could not imagine losing my temper to a point where I thought I needed to spank my child. While I do anticipate that having children will be a real test of patience, I do not expect that I will lose my patience so much that I will spank my children. I find spanking to be a real contradiction to what most parents tell their children. Most parents do not allow their children to hit, whether they are angry or not. Even when kids think another kid did something wrong, or bad, they are still not allowed to hit. If a parent tells a kid this, and then turns around and spanks the kid when they do something wrong, how will the kid ever learn that hitting is wrong? In my opinion, there has to be a better way to discipline children. I think that sending a child to a room where they cannot interact with anyone else, and then taking away a privilege would be a better way of handling discipline. Also, when I was a child, I can remember that when I was angry, my dad would come in to my room after I had time to cool down and talk to me about why I was angry. I can remember these as really fond times with my dad. It helped me identify why I was so angry, and most of the time it was at my mom for not letting me have my way. When I could identify why I was angry, my dad and I could come up with a solution to solve the problem. I think that rather than spanking, this is a good way to discipline children.
Corporal punishment is the physical disciplinary method used by parents, teachers, and school administrators in an effort to correct a child’s undesirable behaviors. The use of physical force is one that is often times controversial and usually evokes very strong reactions. These feelings surface, and opposing views clash, when scandals surrounding corporal punishment hit the media and heated arguments in the comments section of articles emerge. While corporal punishment occasionally makes its way into the limelight, it is a decision all parents are faced with eventually and often times daily. For example, when a toddler is sprawled out on the grocery store floor kicking, hitting, and flinging