What The Research Literature Says About Corporal Punishment
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Physical punishment serves as a model for aggression. Children imitate or model what they see adults due to them. Aggression begets aggression.
Punishment for hitting, shoving and kicking may stop the child's misbehavior temporarily, but it stimulates further aggression in the child. He will learn that it is all right to hurt others. Spanking does not teach the child the'moral message' that you should not hurt or abuse people.
The punishing adult may be identified as a negative and aversive person. When punishment is paired with criticism, name-calling or verbal abuse, the child may become afraid of the punisher. The parent loses trust with the child.
The effects of punishment have been shown to last only for a short time. While the child may stop the inappropriate behavior, the punishment does not teach the child what to do in the future.
After being punished, the child is left in emotional turmoil and resentment. He may focus on fantasy and revenge, which then can grow into hatred.
The child learns not misbehave when the parent is around. The punished behavior may stop only in the presence of the adult. The child may continue the negative behavior when the adult is not around.
The child may stop the behavior for which he is punished and substitute another aggressive act. He may stop the negative behavior such as hitting but then increase other aggressive behavior such as verbal abuse of the person he is upset with.
The frequent use of punishment may cause a child to withdraw or regress into acting younger. He may become non trusting and fearful of others.
The child may lie or become sneaky to avoid being punished. He will not learn to take responsibility for what he did wrong, but may justify it or minimalizes it.
The child may develop negative beliefs of himself that are associated with the frequent use of punishment such as " I'm a bad person. I'm mean." These negative beliefs result in further lowered self-esteem.
When punished, the child may strike back at the person or h e may take his anger and displace it at an object, animal or another child.
When the parent threatens the child with a terrible consequence that is not carried out, there can be several responses. The child can become excessively frightened or the child learns to distrust the parent and view the parent as a liar.
Lynne Namka, Ed. D. © 2002
