Dani Ante
English 1020-003
Sarah Crotzer
17 Nov 2015
Spanking Leads to Negative Behavior, So Think Twice!
Every parent has differing beliefs in how a child must be disciplined. A child’s undesirable behavior is a cause for a parent to spank them to correct them. Simple mistakes made by children, who have yet to develop cognitive reasoning, are not deserving to experience pain. By definition in the psychological world, corporal punishment is used in like terms with spanking. It is the “use of physical force with the intention of causing a child to experience pain, but not to injury, for the purpose of correction or control of the child’s behavior” (Straus 3). There are countless of studies that has been done by psychologists on the effects
…show more content…
According to a research done by Elizabeth Oddone Paolucci and Claudio Violato. They believed “that through experiencing corporal punishment, violent strategies are modeled or imitated and then added to the child 's behavioral repertoire. These strategies are assumed to interfere with the subsequent learning of more cooperative, prosocial conflict resolution strategies” (199). For example, in an assumption that “…physically punitive parents end up with aggressive children, it is because the child has learned some pattern of response. It maybe suggested, alternatively, that the child had a predisposition toward aggressive behavior, and that the punitive parental behavior is a response to the child” (Muller 1324). Underlying the spanking, parents are sending the wrong message to their kid to hit another person, like a sibling. Are parents really teaching their kids a lesson from violence or are they encouraging them? Spanking sets a bad example to prevent behaviors that will conclude in …show more content…
These behaviors are: cheating and lying, bullying or being cruel to others, not feeling sorry after misbehaving, breaking things deliberately, being disobedient in school, and having trouble getting along with teachers (Straus 85). In this specific correlational studies. Measurement factors being considered were the socioeconomic standing of the families, the children’s sex and age, and the parental behaviors. Although there are significant changes in figures due to these primary factors taken into consideration, like the child’s age, the common denominator for all results gathered is that there is a consistency within the different age groups of children and the correlation of the antisocial behaviors are shown. The bottom line is, spanking causes harm to a child’s development regardless of age (87). The change in the behavior shows that a child that is exposed to spanking more, shows an increase in antisocial behaviors. A child that is not exposed to spanking, shows a decrease or no change in the behaviors (88). Antisocial behaviors seen were not only seen to affect that one child, but it affects the neighboring kids around them. This potentially could pose a domino effect with other children. Learned behavior from another kid is enough introduction in the environment of another child to acquire undesirable
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.
Social effects of spanking, therefore, include; fear, spanking teaches a child to be fearful. Spanking is quite shameful and humiliating, when a child is made to undergo spanking from a very young age they grow to be scared and may never have the opportunity to express their opinions openly. They will relate the pain they suffered through physical punishment with older people and this would make them timid even around their teachers. It may also cause them to not listen to their parent and ultimately they grow up to be resentful. Secondly, it makes a child learn violence, this is cultivated when a child interprets that violence is an acceptable means of resolving the conflict. Surveys have over time proven that kids who are spanked will most likely fight and hit other children and will most likely become violent
Holden (2002) reviewed Gershoff’s (2002) meta-analyses of eighty-eight (88) studies and noted that there were both positive and negative outcomes associated with the punishment of spanking. According to Gershoff’s (2002) analysis, the one positive outcome was immediate compliance by the child (Holden, 2002). This result was found to be consistent in five (5) studies. Immediate compliance was defined as the child complying to the parents directive within five (5) seconds. In stark contrast, there were four (4) negative outcomes. The analysis showed a negative effect on the quality of the parent child relationship, the child’s mental health, the child’s perception of being a victim of physical child abuse, and also impacted aggression in adulthood (Holden, 2002).
Spanking teaches the child that violence is a socially accepted behavior to attain a desired result. To better understand this concept, we must first look at how a child’s brain works. From infancy, children learn through observation and imitation. Studies have shown that infants as young as forty-two minutes can successfully replicate simple facial expressions (Metzloff, Decety 492). By eight months, infants can imitate basic motor movement, even after twenty-four hours have passed since the initial movement occurred. At fourteen months, children can apply an imitation to an external situation up to a week after the initial imitation. (Windell, 67-68, 221). A famous example of this is Albert Bandura’s Bobo doll experiment. Christopher Green of York University helps interpret Bandura’s experiment and results: While acknowledging that certain children may have inherited aggressive personalities, Bandura demonstrated that the majority of personality is learned. Adult models were escorted to a room and shown various toys to play with while child observers watched from outside the room. Among the various toys was a clown “bobo” doll. In some “play” sessions, the models demonstrated aggression toward the doll by punching, kicking, hitting and yelling at it. In other sessions, the models quietly pla...
In this study they explored the association of spanking frequency before age 2 throughout different ethnicities, with children’s risk for tremendous behavior problems 4 years later, after they had entered school. Among the children in this sample, spanking frequency before age 2 was definitely a predictor of a child’s risk for behavior problems at
First of all, spanking does not lead to violence. Our surrounding world and media do. "The average sixteen-year- old has watched 18,000 murders during his formative years, including a daily bombardment of stabbings, shootings, hangings, decapitations, and general dismemberment" (Meier 34). It seems unjust to blame parents who are trying to raise their children properly for today's violence. If a child touches a hot stove he does not become a more violent person because of it, he just learns not to do it again because he learned a valuable lesson from the pain (Meier 34).
Spanking can cause a child’s perception to become confusing. They start to recognize adults as violent, and get scared of them, making them questionable of family, teachers, and other adults. They see their parents hitting them, so they think that it’s okay to hurt others, and they think it’s okay to put their anger on someone else. Spanking teaches a child fear, teaching them that they have to lie so they don’t get struck, causing them to continually lie throughout their life. It’s not right to hit your child, while teaching them not to hurt others, it can often confuse them, and that’s when they start to make up their own rules. “Spanking teaches your child to fear you -- not to listen to you or respect you. He may also be humiliated and resentful, and retaliate by being uncooperative.” Spanking teaches your child that they should fear adults, and if they fear adults, how are they going to advance? How are they going to get guidance from you and family, or teachers in school? Spanking your child affects their whole life, and not in a good way. You have to give your child sympathetic guidance and teach them that mistakes are okay. Parenting is about guiding children to be the best they can, parents need to help them learn in a healthy
I have read several articles recently on the negative effects of discipline, particularly spanking. Refraining from spanking children has become the new "normal" for many households. In the past three years of working in childcare, I have seen many different children from many types of homes. Interestingly enough, after spending about fifteen minutes with a child one is able to tell whether or not they were spanked. In my own experience, children who have been "spared the rod" tend to have more
The researchers find that frequent use of corporal punishment on three-year-olds (spanking more than twice over the course of a month) was associated with increased aggressive behavior at five years of age…even "minor" forms of corporal punishment, including spanking, increase children's risk of aggressive behavior
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...
There has been a misconception about how to properly discipline children due to secular views and flawed studies. Many of these so called “studies” have made “many experts believe that corporal punishment will likely lead to increased resistance or aggressive behavior from the child” ("Corporal Punishment." World Book Advanced). One study in particular “suggests that children who experienced harsh spanking (with objects or at a frequency of once a week or more with a hand) had significantly higher levels of mother-reported externalizing behavior at ages 6, 7, and 8 than did children who experienced no spanking or mild spanking at those ages, even controlling for prior externalizing behavior and other possible confounds.” ( Lansford ). However, aggressive behavior should be expected if a parent beats their child out of their own anger instead of a desire to better their child for the future. There are several other “studies” that claim to prove spanking increases negative behavior but they just lump them all together and say that all spanking in every form, regardless of it severity, is the same and creates worse children. “Any form of punishment, physical or otherwise, can have negative consequences if it is abused.”. (Green) If parents don’t discipline their children physically, they will ve...
Spanking is serious issues in the United States. Some researchers believe spanking children causes externalizing behavior. The more children display aggressive behavior the more likely, the disciplined. This article examines the transactional connection between spanking and the externalizing (negative) behavior through the early years of a child’s life. In other words children aggressiveness from birth to middle childhood depends on how often they will receive a spanking. However, some theory claims that there should be a transitional association between the parent’s correction and children’s externalize behavior through transition to adulthood. The study of spanking over the past decades has proof that corporal punishment is later connected
Some people believe spanking a child is child abuse, and that it causes the child to grow up aggressive and violent. This would mean that every child that is spanked during their developmental stages will grow up to be an example of bad behavior. However, there is no actual data or information that can confirm that spanking a child will cause a child to grow up to be violent or too aggressive. Children have been trained to obey rules or a set code of behavior for centuries. It is the best way to mold a child to be a respectable adult, and they can pass on the behavior to their future children. It may not always happen, but its pretty effective.
Any parent who has threatened to spank a child to modify behavior has observed the immediate change in demeanor. Psychologists tell us, however, that corporal punishment has no more of a desired effect on a child in the long term than alternative disciplinary methods such as a timeout or revoking privileges. Sweden proved that corporal punishment is no more effective than alternative methods and law enforcement officers are no more burdened by the laws put in place to protect the physical integrity of children. If in fact opponents and proponents are both right, their methods both work equally as well as the other, which one is the right one? Can they both be right? Unless we are going to make it legal to go around hitting each other for being snarky, rude, disrespectful, not paying attention, or just out of irritation due to undesirable behavior, the right thing to do is protect the most innocent of our kind. The right thing to do is give our children the same rights we give our family, friends, neighbors, and strangers. The moral thing to do is lead by example. The answer is
First of all parents feel that the children are theirs, and they can spank them when they misbehave. There are many factors that lead to physical punishment: parents were to young and not ready for children, parents are going trough a divorce and need to take out their anger on something or someone, or parents do not know another way to punish their children. These children grow up to be aggressive and often abusive towards others. Although parents think this is the only way of educating their children there are many other alternatives.