What for many societies is a normal punishment, for some specialists it is more than that since children could experience aggressive and antisocial behavior in their adulthood.
The report, which was conducted by specialists from the University of Texas at Austin and of the University of Michigananalyzed five decades of research, in which the behavior of more than 160,000 children was observed.
Published in the April edition of the specialized magazine Journal of Family Psychologyconstitutes the most complete analysis of the effects of the “spanking” and spanking in children.
«Our analysis focuses on what most Americans would recognize as spanking and not on potentially abusive behaviors.»explained Elizabeth Gershoff, an associate professor of family sciences and human development at the University of Texas at Austin.
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«We found that spanking is associated with undesired detrimental outcomes and not with greater immediate or long-term obedience or compliance, which are the outcomes expected by parents when disciplining their children.»according to the statement in which the results of the study are disseminated.
Gershoff and study co-author, Andrew Grogan Kayloran associate professor at the University of Michigan School of Social Work, found that spanking or spanking, defined as an open-handed blow to the buttocks or extremities, was associated with 13 of the 17 outcomes examined, in the harmful direction.
“The conclusion of the study is that spanking increases the likelihood of a wide variety of undesirable outcomes for children. Spanking, therefore, does the opposite of what parents usually want it to do.»Grogan Kaylor said.
Gershoff and Grogan looked at some long-term effects among adults who were spanked as children. The more spankings they received, the more likely they were to exhibit antisocial behavior and experience mental health problems.
They were also more likely to support physical punishment for their own children, highlighting one of the main ways that attitudes towards physical punishment are passed down from generation to generation.
The researchers looked at a wide range of studies and noted that spanking is associated with negative outcomes consistently and across all types of studies, including those using the strongest methodologies such as longitudinal or experimental designs.
up to a 80 percent of parents around the worldoccasionally spank their children, according to a report from the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in 2014.
Gershoff said this persistence of spanking is despite the fact that there is no clear evidence of positive effects of spanking and instead there is ample evidence that it poses a risk of harm to children’s behavior and development.
Taken from Informer