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Disciplining Children

The question of child discipline with its implications for personality development continue to be a contentious issue in the daily press and on the radio.

The trouble is that within sociology and psychology there are schools of thought that are so politically correct that they simply do not follow scientific methods. One outstanding example is a study which, not too long ago, set out to prove that most men are violent. One of the assumptions was that everything from a flicked ear upwards, or even a sharp word, should be classified as "violence".

More recently, one woman whom I was listening to on the radio felt she was presenting a forceful argument when she sought to answer the often-heard line, "I was smacked when I was a kid, and it didn't do me any harm". Her reply was to the effect that no-one can tell what the result would have been if the speaker had not been smacked when he was a kid.

What can longitudinal studies tell us about corporal punishment and personality development? Do we need to distinguish between corporal punishment and what the politically correct like to call "mental violence"? Do we need to distinguish between degrees of corporal punishment? Obviously blows that cause bruising may be psychologically traumatic, but does a smacked bottom have the same effect? And are children who are never smacked by their parents any less likely to grow up into delinquent teenagers or anti-social adults? Has there ever been a study comparing schools which use corporal punishment and those which do not?

The excellent cohort study being conducted at Dunedin University must have revealed answers to some of these questions, but I have not seen anything on the subject in the popular press. Is the climate too politically correct for honest answers?

Perhaps we could even have an article on the subject in NZSM.

C J Craigie, Upper Hutt

Our last look at this topic was in April 1993 -- we'll check with the researchers to see if their work has continued and what it can tell us. Keep reading!