Corporal Punishment: Good or Bad?
There are many different ways of disciplining a child. Corporal punishment is one of the main ones. Corporal punishment is defined as intentionally inflicting pain on the body for purposes of punishment or controlling behaviour. Corporal punishment comes in different forms, there is teachers punishing students as discipline, and then there is the most common form of corporal punishment which is the punishment administered by parents. Corporal punishment is not a necessary or a long-term effective form of discipline.
The home is the most common place nowadays where corporal punishment is used. Parents spank/hit their child to keep them from misbehaving. Hitting children may actually increase misbehaviour. One large study showed that the more parents spank children for rebellious behaviour, the more the rebellious behaviour increased. The more children are hit, the more likely they are to hit others including peers and siblings and when they become adults, they are likely to hit their spouses and their children.
Hitting them teaches that it is acceptable to hit others who are smaller and weaker. Being spanked is an emotional event for a child. Children often remember with crystal clarity times they were spanked. Many adults look back on corporal punishment in childhood with great anger and sadness. It is hard to believe that people who loved us would intentionally hurt us. Studies show that even a few instances of being hit as children are associated with more depressive symptoms as adults. This form of discipline, corporal punishment only induces fear in a child and does not make the problem go away, it's a short-term way of controlling the behaviour of a child. Children deserve to be protected from this cruel and obsolete practice.
Many people think if we don't spank children, they'll grow up rotten.