Source: abcnews.go.com
UNITED STATES, April 12, 2010: Spanking toddlers makes for more aggressive kindergartners, according to a new study from Tulane University in New Orleans. While organizations like the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Center for Effective Discipline staunchly advocate against corporal punishment, many parents continue to turn to the rod when disciplining their children.
In a 2005 online poll, 72 percent of adults reported that it was “OK to spank a child.” Various studies in recent years found the prevalence of corporal punishment varied widely, from 35 percent of parents to 90 percent, authors of the Tulane study note.
Even when controlling for other factors that affect child aggression by age five, such as parental neglect, maternal depression and stress, and the child’s aggressive tendencies as a toddler, researchers found that maternal aggression begets childhood aggression. Toddlers who are spanked were more likely to grow into kindergarteners that bully, hit, and were destructive and disobedient.
“Children imitate behavior that their parents model for them. If both parents use spanking as a means of controlling their children, then their children are much more likely to use physical force with playmates and siblings,” notes Edward Christophersen, clinical pediatric psychologist at Children’s Mercy Hospital and Clinics in Kansas City, Mo.
Though many child organizations now take an anti-spanking position, spanking and other forms of physical discipline still play a role in the upbringing of many American children — even if a parent does not use corporal punishment in the home. Twenty states still allow the practice in their public schools.