Why Parents Shouldn’t Spank Children

There is no doubt in every parent’s mind that every young child needs to be disciplined. The question – and this is one that baffles a lot of parents …

What is the best way to do so?

One of the biggest controversies in the world of child discipline is whether spanking children does more harm than good or if it’s the other way around.  And does it even affect child obedience?

Centuries back, hitting or spanking was the only way to discipline children. It was an accepted norm and everybody practices it. As years have passed by though, countless studies have been conducted to determine whether spanking is really an effective way to discipline kids. Most of them voted against it.

Why? What are the negative effects spanking has on children?

According to Murray Straus, a study researcher of the University of Hampshire who conducted a study on the negative effects of spanking, the more a child is spanked the lower his IQ is compared to other kids of his age.

Straus and his colleague Mallie Paschall studied samples of two groups – group one were made up of children age 2 to 4 and group two made up of kids age 5 to 9. The researchers tested the kids’ IQ initially and then tested it again after four years.

While both groups of kids got smarter after 4 years, the kids on group 1 who were spanked scored 5 points lower than the kids who were not spanked. For group 2, the spanked children scored 2.8 lower (on average) than those who were not spanked.

Although Strauss admitted that other factors could be at play such as the parents’ socioeconomic status, he is still convinced that spanking causes a slowdown in a child’s development of mental abilities.

Another reason not to spank children is because it’s really not effective at all. Sure, nothing is quicker than a swat or two on the butt to make a child behave but this method becomes more ineffective as the child grows older. In a study published in Pediatrics, researchers at Tulane University presented the strongest evidence yet which shows that spanking children make them act out in the long run. Of the 2, 500 children in the study, those who were spanked frequently at 3 years old became more aggressive as they turned 5.

Note that this study, led by community-health-sciences professor Catherine Taylor, controlled the issues that may be affecting the mother such as alcohol and drug use, depression and spousal abuse (factors which may also affect the child’s behavior).

Hitting models hitting. You are your child’s primary role model, and hitting your child is actually showing him that it’s okay to hit. Not only that, but you’re showing your child that it’s okay for big people to hit little people or for stronger people to hit weaker people.

Some people may reason out that they don’t spank their child often, but even so, you run the risk of them remembering the spanking. Remember that children love to imitate people, especially those that they see often, and there’s a very high chance that they will copy the spanking. There were more than a number of cases where an older child started spanking his or her younger sibling, and it’s all because they were copying mommy or daddy.

If you think I’m just relying on studies here, let me share my experience when I was young. My mom used to spank me whenever I misbehaved or acted like a disrespectful child. Although she was not abusive, I remember the shame spanking brings. I was ashamed because I’ve been “bad”, but I was also angry because the person who was supposed to love me was hurting me. My mom was not abusive or anything. In fact, she was a very loving person who cares for me dearly. However, this just shows that a child is not protected from feeling anger and shame whenever he or she’s spanked by the parent – no matter how loving the parent is.

There are a lot of better alternatives to spanking. In fact, studies also show that spanking is not more effective than time-outs as how some parents believe. If this is the case, then why hurt your child when you can discipline him or her just as effectively using another method?

I am a parent too, and I know how it felt like to be spanked. This is the main reason why I don’t spank my kids, and why I encourage other parents to do the same.