Corporal Punishment Toward Children

LITERATURE REVIEW

Corporal punishment under current law in most parts of the world is considered to be a form of violence against children. It has been branded as the most common violence as it often involves using physical force that inflicts so much pain on children. Non-physical forms of punishment can also fall into this category if the result is severe and the method is cruel. However, despite being considered harmful, it remains widely used by parents, and the effects range from the children being more aggressive and even exhibiting antisocial behavior. So basically, corporal punishment violates the rights of children to protection. It also denies children the right to fair treatment. It is awful for some children to be subjected to corporal punishment, and their friends are not.

Parents and teachers are responsible for ensuring that their children do not misbehave. However, that does not mean they use excessive force and harsh punishment. The preferred ways would be providing guidance and light punishment, not corporal punishment. However, many people have argued that it is more effective and that the results can be seen immediately. Yes, that is true, but the chances of this turning to physical maltreatment are very high. The government, together with other organizations that protect human rights, needs to step up and ensure that corporal punishment is made illegal to discourage parents and teachers from using it. These corporal punishments that need to be done away with include spanking, kicking, blows, and subjecting children to fixed postures for a certain period. Some instruments are used to provide corporal punishment, which makes it even worse. The instruments vary from straps and fists to baseball bats. These instruments inflict so much pain and trauma on the children.

This paper will mainly focus on parents as most children get corporal punishment at home rather than in schools. It will also look into existing works on corporal punishment and the findings of the works. The findings that will be discussed are the effects of corporal punishment on children’s behaviors. The results will be discussed to come up with a conclusion.

Hypotheses

1. Corporal punishment causes children to be violent and more aggressive
2. Corporal punishment affects the mental health of children, as most fall into depression
3. Corporal punishment makes children to be antisocial
4. Corporal punishment causes a strain on the relationship between the parent and child
5. Corporal punishment is effective in dealing with bad behaviour.

Theoretical Evidence

Some of the theories and works that relate to the topic of discussion include the Social Learning Theory and Attachment Theory, among many others.

Social Learning Theory

This theory was brought forward by a psychologist called Albert Bandura. Bandura suggested that there are three ways through which people learn: attention/observation, retention, and imitation. The first core concept is modelling, which he considers an integral part of the learning process, and models serve as an essential source for observational learning (Rumjaun, 2020). The second core concept of his theory is that intrinsic reinforcement is a necessary component of the learning process. In his theory of social learning, Bandura describes intrinsic reinforcement as the form of an internal reward, for example, a feeling of pride, confidence, satisfaction, or accomplishment one attains upon behaving a certain way, thus serves as a motivating factor and can play a crucial role in learning and development of a child. The third core is that people learn by observing others in a setting.

So, how does Bandura’s theory relate to corporal punishment toward children? Children learn by observing and imitating the behaviour of those who raise them (Rotter, 2021). When a parent or teacher decides to use corporal punishment, the child would likely take up the aggressive behaviour and, in the process, become violent. In addition to that, the child might grow up with the perception that the right way to handle things is by using violence, as they also become tolerant of violence. These children are also likely to start exhibiting negative behaviours such as delinquency. They might also become sad, feel threatened, or fall into depression. Therefore, parents, guardians, and teachers must not be aggressive with children so that they grow up with the best behavior.

Attachment Theory

This theory was also brought forward by another psychologist, John Bowlby. He focused on the bonds in the relationship between parents and their children and intimate partners (Allen, 2023). He tried to explain psychologically people’s emotional bonds and how these bonds impact their lives. John argued that we are all born with the desire or urge to develop certain bonds with our parents at a young age. He further said children’s bonds with their parents are essential as they may significantly influence their lives. He described this as “lasting psychological connectedness between human beings.”

Attachment theory suggests that parents raise their children well to develop strong and meaningful bonds so that when they grow, they view and approach everything differently (Granqvist, 2021). When a parent uses corporal punishment, he or she poses the danger of breaking the bond between them. When such bonds are broken, then the trust between the child and the parent may be lost. This may make the child resentful, become distant from the parent, or even ruin their chances of developing relationships with other people in the future.

Empirical Evidence

Most of the studies and theories have proven beyond reasonable doubt how corporal punishment is linked with adverse outcomes in children. Most of the empirical evidence used has used quantitative methods to reduce the chances of bias (Page, 2021).

A Study by Elizabeth Thompson Gershoff on Corporal Punishment by Parents and Associated Child Behavior and Experiences

The existing knowledge gap in studies done on corporal punishment and the effects it had on children pushed Elizabeth to go ahead with the study. She acknowledged that for decades, there have been merits of using corporal punishment by parents to ensure their children are well-behaved, but they were not aware of its effects on the children (Gershoff, 2020). The author presented results that had been meta-analyzed on the relationship between corporal punishment and more than ten child behaviors. The behaviours presented were aggression, moral internalization, delinquency, criminal, antisocial behaviour, quality of the relationship between parent and child, adult abuse of own child or partner, being a victim of physical abuse, mental health, and immediate compliance from children.

The author revealed that she used three primary sources, all of which were articles that examined this topic. In total, she picked 88 studies to be included in the meta-analysis. From all these studies, the total number of participants was as high as 36.309, with each study averaging 413. In these studies, the reported cases of corporal punishment were as follows: spanking, used in 26% of the studies, and physical punishment, accounting for 24%.

She used all 11 behaviours as constructs to be used in the meta-analysis and conducted separate analyses on each of the dependent variables. What she found out was that ten out of eleven analyses showed that corporal punishment was linked to children having undesired behaviors. This is the result: moral internalization is reduced, children become more aggressive, children become more delinquent, the relationship between parent and child deteriorates, they become antisocial, their mental health worsens, and there is an increased risk of abusing their child. Children complying immediately was The only positive behaviour linked to corporal punishment.

However, she cited that most of the meta-analyses were made out of a minimal number of studies since more moderators were there to be tested compared to their effect sizes. For preliminary purposes and understanding, she only tested five child behaviours, which were conceptually very close to her. From her meta-analyses of the 88 studies, she concluded that corporal punishment has a strong association with child behaviors. From the data, 94% of the sizes correlated with the undesired behaviour. Two constructs showed solid relations, yet there was a contrast between them: compliance and physical abuse (Heilmann, 2021).

Towards the end, she added that statistics based on meta-analysis cannot outdo psychology as correlation does not prove cause. She was keen to warn that corporal punishment might not be the cause of child behaviors except immediate compliance as it relies on correlation. This calls for caution when making conclusions measured in adults from child behaviours. Finally, as this study and the meta-analyses focused on corporal punishment, it is important not to relate the findings to other forms of punishment.

Study on Corporal punishment and child behavioural and cognitive outcomes through 5 years-of-age

This study sought to determine how common spanking was among parents with children of the age of 3 years. It also sought to connect the children’s spanking and behaviour at age 5. At age 3, the percentage of mothers who spanked their children was 55%, while fathers were 43%. The high percentage of mothers could be attributed to stress (Avezum, 2023). The other percentage of mothers who do not spank their children are more likely to have a supportive partner and not be from the United States. The study found out there was no evidence to show that race, a child’s gender, and the parent’s warmth influenced spanking. However, the findings of the study were that spanking had negative consequences.

To fill the existing research gap, the study included spanking from the fathers in the analysis. This is because it had been given little attention. The data used by the study was obtained from the Fragile Families and Children Well-being Study. They also interviewed parents in the hospitals immediately after the successful delivery of the children. The interviews followed when the children attained one year, three years, and finally five years. This data was divided into three sets, one to determine how common spanking was at three years from the father and mother. The Second was to check for the child’s behaviour; the final set was five years.

The total number of families in the study was 1110, with very few, around 4% being Asian, non-Hispanic, and Native American. They measured spanking frequency by asking parents whether they spanked their children. The expected answer from the parents was a simple yes or no. From the first result, 55% of the maternal side agreed to spanking their children at three years. Of this population, 11% accounted for those who did it twice or more a week, while those who did it less than twice a week were around 44%. The shocking result was that 24% of these mothers agreed to spanking their kids at one year. On the behaviour exhibited by children aged 5, 30 mothers were asked. Twenty of them said they witnessed cases of aggression and then talked about breaking the rules (Wiggers, 2022).

The study also found that the frequency and number of children spanked increased from 1 to 3. From the data, 24% of the children were spanked at age 1, and at the age of 3, the number had doubled to 55%. Of these, black families spanked more than White and Hispanic families combined. Mothers who had supportive partners were less likely to spank their children. For fathers, they were less likely to spank children at the age of 1 and girls. For parents who raised their children in a society where spanking was expected, they were more likely to use spanking.

The study showed that stress in the family and socioeconomic factors have a significant impact. Too much stress in the family could result in children being spanked by their parents. It was also established that spanking could have been more effective, and other alternatives should be considered. There should never be a debate on whether corporal punishment can be used but at a reduced rate of intensity because, after all, the effects are the same and still severe. Victims of corporal punishment will tell you that it not only makes them sad, angry, and threatened but also affects them psychologically.

Physical punishment and child outcomes: a narrative review of prospective studies

There have been attempts by scholars to distinguish between physical punishment and abuse. This article provides a valuable protocol for meta-analyses and systematic reviews on corporal punishment in schools and at home. The authors developed four hypotheses to guide their research (Heilmann, 2021). They were associated with physical punishment, mental health, and social-emotional outcomes. Physical punishment would be more effective at an early age; different physical punishments yield different results, and physical punishment and an outcome might be necessary in different settings.

A review was conducted on peer-reviewed articles and journals. This review used quantitative approaches to establish a relationship between corporal punishment in children and the corresponding outcomes. Quantitative approaches were also used as the data is less likely to be subject to bias. Using different sources, they extracted qualitative data and statistics from the sources to get standard mean sizes. Multi-level analyses were deployed to analyze the obtained data, and the findings were subjected to narrative synthesis. The study participants were primarily children and adolescents.

They began reviewing works published in 2002, as it was when the first analysis into physical punishment was done. The studies that were considered for review were those that talked about physical punishment and not child abuse. Using this criteria, they ended up with 68 articles on 69 studies. The studies were grouped into nine categories: behaviours that are externally visible, inward behaviour, challenging behaviours, and cognitive abilities, among others.

The study found that physical punishment had terrible outcomes in 59% of the samples. In contrast, no sample showed any benefit of physical punishment. 13 out of 19 showed that physical punishment increased external behaviors. 5 out of 6 showed an increase in aggression among children. Two studies showed the development of antisocial behaviour, while two did not. From the analysis, all studies reported cases of internalized behaviours. Physical punishment also increased behavioural problems, but no study has connected physical punishment and social competence.

Discussion

From that, they concluded that physical punishment could be effective as it improves a child’s behaviour, and after a long time, it causes problems. These problems are primarily behavioral, as a child’s behavior worsens over time. Physical punishment was also found to increase the risk of maltreatment among children. Parents and teachers should consider using other ways to correct children’s behavior. Some of these ways may be as simple as just sitting down and talking with them. Tell them what you expect from them, and they will listen. This will not only help in avoiding abuse but also help them grow in the right way. It will also help maintain a good relationship between the parent and the child. Even from a Biblical point of view, there is nowhere God has instructed children to be punished for their wrongdoings. So, it is null and void for those considering the Bible to justify their actions. However, the study’s main limitation was that it was primarily conducted in the United States, with only eight studies in other countries.

References

Allen, B. (2023). The historical foundations of contemporary attachment theory: From John Bowlby to Mary Ainsworth.

Avezum, M. D. M. D. M., Altafim, E. R. P., & Linhares, M. B. M. (2023). Spanking and corporal punishment parenting practices and child development: a systematic review. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 24(5), 3094-3111.

Gershoff, E. T., & Lee, S. J. (2020). Afterword: Common themes and next steps.

Granqvist, P. (2021). Attachment, culture, and gene-culture co-evolution: expanding the evolutionary toolbox of attachment theory. Attachment & Human Development, 23(1), 90-113.

Heilmann, A., Mehay, A., Watt, R. G., Kelly, Y., Durrant, J. E., van Turnhout, J., & Gershoff, E. T. (2021). Physical punishment and child outcomes: a narrative review of prospective studies. The Lancet, 398(10297), 355-364.

Page, M. J., Sterne, J. A., Higgins, J. P., & Egger, M. (2021). We are investigating and dealing with publication bias and other reporting biases in meta‐analyses of health research: A review. Research synthesis methods, 12(2), 248-259.

Rotter, J. B. (2021). Social learning theory. In Expectations and actions (pp. 241-260). Routledge.

Rumjaun, A., & Narod, F. (2020). Social Learning Theory—Albert Bandura. Science education in theory and practice: An introductory guide to learning theory, 85-99.

Wiggers, M., & Paas, F. (2022). Harsh physical discipline and externalizing behaviors in children: a systematic review. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(21), 14385.