Spanking Debate: Positive vs. Negative Discipline

Spanking Debate: Positive vs. Negative Discipline: VIDEO

Do you care about all child abuse victims?

It is weird and sad how society claims to be against child abuse and supports child abuse victims, that is as long as they are still children, that is. Because, if an adult currently, even though a past child of abuse, it is seen as not that important to care. Especially so, if they don’t live up to society’s standards. Victims of child abuse often suffer negative life outcomes. But you blame them even though society does not ensure they get free health care and mental health therapy such things as “child abuse,” require. If they end up in addiction, suffer food insecurities, homelessness, and are compelled into crime; people blame the unhelped child abuse victims. I am an extreme child abuse victim, and I have as well as do suffered mentally/emotionally. I suffered from addiction, food insecurities, homelessness, and was compelled into crime. I almost did not make it out alive.

I am Anti Spanking

Five Decades of Research Confirms:

Spanking Produces Similar Outcomes in Children as Physical Abuse.

I am anti-spanking as I value the nonaggression principle which basically states that it is immoral to initiate the use of aggressive force which is not directly for self or other defense against another human being. Spanking is the use of aggressive force a clear violation of the non-aggression principle, and thus an immoral action.

Spanking children slows cognitive development and increases risk of criminal behavior, expert says.

Psychologytoday.com Taking Non-Aggressive Approach Towards Discipline

Spanking Violates Non-Aggression

Children need to have the same right as adults to protection from abuse from either public or private sources.

• Hitting your wife is called ‘domestic violence’ and is a crime;
• Hitting another adult is called ‘assault’ and is a crime;
• Hitting a child is called ‘discipline’ and is not a crime? WTF

Some will say with deep conviction but I still believe that spanking works …
Terrorism always works but what it produces is terror and fear. Your beliefs that support spanking you are putting over the facts of science do you think that truly is a valid way to live life? You can have deep conviction and all that is proof of is deep conviction, nothing more just like religion beliefs without evidence and keeping belief that contradicts the evidence.

I hear it said if you don’t spank your child you can’t raise them right. This is not empirically proven in fact it is demonstrable to the opposite. But that aside I feel such a statement is on par with saying one cannot have morality without religion an equally false statement. Furthermore, I am taken back when atheists say such things about child rearing that not spanking the child you spoil them. This seems to be limited in one’s creative thinking if the only way to raise good children requires physical violence as a needed method. I would think rational thinkers would not be so confined in their creativity to inspire others.

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

We know enough now to stop hitting kids. We know it has a detrimental effect on intelligence. We know it has long-term negative implications for physical and emotional well-being. We know it is related to a greater propensity for violence in adulthood. And we know that it is effective only for teaching immediate compliance.

But I know screw science go with evidenceless beliefs right and be pro spanking?

It makes me sick when people still stick with tradition and personal opinion over science. Science is telling you that you’re wrong. Science does not care what you believe. It will not change based on your opinions or beliefs. No child should be spanked, we need correction and training not abusive force and the science agrees.

Nobody deserves to be hit. Children are not “little bastards”. They are children who are still growing and developing. It’s our job to support their development, and guide them toward acceptable behaviors. You do this through talking to your child and modeling.

There are many reasons why children should never be Spanked or subjected to any other kind of corporal punishment. Three of the most fundamental reasons:

1. Spanking has serious harmful side effects that parents have no way of seeing, because such effects do not show up until later.

2. Spanking is no more effective than other methods of correction and control, and it is therefore unnecessary to subject children to the risk of the harmful side effects.

3. Spanking contradicts the ideal of nonviolence in the family and society American Psychological Association opposes the use of corporal punishment

APA’s Committee on Children, Youth and Families (CYF) and the Board for the Advancement of Psychology in the Public Interest Council voted to adopt the following resolution on corporal punishment.The American Psychological Association opposes the use of corporal punishment in schools, juvenile facilities, child care nurseries, and all other institutions, public or private, where children are cared for or educated.

http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/04/spanking.aspx
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2010/05/corporal-punishment.aspx
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2002/06/spanking.aspx
http://www.apa.org/about/policy/corporal-punishment.aspx

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Children and Parental Discipline

How should parents raise their children? Given the critical importance of the first few years and even months of life for a child’s intellectual, emotional, and behavioral development, it is essential to identify the best ways to raise kids. We can talk about how much time parents should spend with their children, how often they should read to them, what time they should put them to bed, and other topics. But for many people, the question of raising children means how parents should discipline their children. While no one right answer to this question exists that will satisfy everyone, scholars identify at least four styles of discipline (Welch, 2010). We will look briefly at these types and at a related issue, spanking. Parents who practice authoritarian discipline may often spank their children, but spanking is thought to promote antisocial behavior among children overall rather than to inhibit it.

The first style of discipline, and the one that most childhood scholars favor, is called authoritative or firm-but-fair discipline. In this style of discipline, parents set clear rules for their children’s behavior but at the same time let their kids exercise independent judgment. When their children do misbehave, the parents patiently explain to them why their behavior was wrong and, if necessary, discipline them with time-outs, groundings, and similar responses. They rarely, if ever, spank their children and in general provide them much emotional support. Most childhood experts think authoritative discipline aids children’s moral development and helps produce children who are well behaved (Ginsburg, Durbin, Garcia-España, Kalicka, & Winston, 2009).

Many parents instead of practice authoritarian discipline. These parents set firm but overly restrictive rules for their children’s behavior and are generally not very warm toward them. When their children misbehave, the parents may yell at them and punish them with relatively frequent and even harsh spankings. Although these parents think such punishment is necessary to teach kids how to behave, many childhood experts think their authoritarian discipline ironically produces children who are more likely to misbehave (McKee et al., 2007).

A third style of discipline is called lax or permissive. As these names imply, parents set few rules for their children’s behavior and don’t discipline them when they misbehave. These children, too, are more apt than children raised by authoritative parents to misbehave during childhood and adolescence.

Uninvolved discipline is the fourth and final type. Parents who practice this style generally provide their children with little emotional support and fail to set rules for their behavior. This style of parenting is associated with antisocial behavior by children and other negative outcomes, especially when compared with authoritative parenting.

One reason that authoritative discipline is better than authoritarian discipline for children is that it avoids spanking in favor of other, more “reasoning” types of discipline and punishment. Many experts think spanking is bad for children and makes them more likely, not less likely, to misbehave. Spanking, they say, teaches children that they should behave to avoid being punished. This lesson makes children more likely to misbehave if they think they will not get caught, as they do not learn to behave for its own sake. Spanking also teaches children it is acceptable to hit someone to solve an interpersonal dispute and even to hit someone if you love her or him because that is what spanking is all about. Children who are spanked may also resent their parents more than children raised authoritatively and thus be more likely to misbehave because their relationship with their parents is not as close. Thus even though parents who spank do so because they believe in the old saying “Spare the rod and spoil the child,” spanking ironically can make children more likely, not less likely, to misbehave (Berlin et al., 2009).

Nonaggression Parenting

Anti-Spanking

Peaceful Discipline

Loving Guidance

Peaceful Parenting

Positive Discipline

Attachment Parenting

Discipline That Work: Peaceful/Positive Parenting and Peaceful Discipline

Why Positive Parenting?  

Children misbehave when they feel bad about themselves and disconnected from us. The word “Discipline” means to teach, which raises the question of how kids learn how to behave. Research shows that children learn best when they feel heard and valued, not when they feel on the defensive. Here’s how to use loving guidance, so you can get out of the discipline business altogether. ref

How to Use Loving Guidance  

Your ten-step guide to putting positive parenting to work in your house, from setting limits effectively to weaning yourself off yelling and punishment. ref

What’s Wrong with Strict Parenting?  

Most parents assume that strict parenting produces better-behaved kids. However, research studies on discipline consistently show that strict, or authoritarian, child-raising actually produces unhappy kids who feel bad about themselves and behave worse than other kids — and therefore get punished more! Here’s why. ref

What’s Wrong with Permissive Parenting?  

Infants’ wants are identical to their needs. But over time, that changes. Toddlers’ wants are often in direct opposition to their long-term developmental needs and safety. When parents don’t make that developmental leap and learn to set limits, their children don’t develop the ability to tolerate frustration or to manage themselves. These children are often referred to by others as “spoiled.” ref

How to Set Effective Limits with Your Child  

Setting limits is an important part of parenting. Limits keep our children safe and healthy and socialize them enough so that they can function happily in society. And if we do it right, our kids will internalize the ability to set limits for themselves, which is otherwise known as self-discipline. Why neither permissiveness nor strictness works, and how to chart an effective middle course. ref

Empathetic Limits in Action: Leaving the Playground  

Mommy: “Avery, you must be getting hungry. Its time to walk home and make some yummy peanut butter sandwiches for lunch. Would you like to walk or ride in the stroller?”

Avery: “No Mommy, I’m sitting on the swing.” ref

What’s Wrong with Timeouts?  

Why timeouts are vastly better than hitting, but sabotage your child’s development and create power struggles — and what to do instead. ref

Why Consequences are Just More Ineffective Punishment  

Why consequences, as used by most parents, create defiant children and teach all the wrong lessons — and what to do instead. ref

The Truth About Consequences  

My Aha! Parenting moment last week came when my husband called me three times to email him something at work. He often works on a computer at home and then emails himself documents so he can access them from the computer at his job. A couple of times a year, he’ll forget to send himself something important, so he’ll call me and ask me to email it to him. Luckily, I have a home office, so it’s easy for me to go to his computer and email it. ref

Parenting Your Strong-Willed Child  

Breaking a child’s will is a betrayal of the spiritual contract we make as parents to nurture our child’s unique gifts. That said, strong-willed kids can be a handful — high energy, challenging, persistent. How do we protect those fabulous qualities and still encourage their cooperation — without going crazy? ref

Don’t Give In….Give Choices!  

Giving choices may be the single most useful tool parents have for managing life with young children. It really is almost a magic wand, at least until children are about five. ref

Helping Your Child With Anger  

All kids — like all humans — get angry. When we feel threatened, we move into fight, flight or freeze. Anger is the body’s “fight” response. ref

When Your Child Acts Out but Can’t Cry: Building Safety  

There will be times when you embrace your acting-out child with your warm compassion and he bursts into tears, sobs his heart out, and is cooperative and delightful for the rest of the day. But more often, your child will be too frightened of that logjam of emotion he’s been tamping down. The problem is, he needs to cry to release all those feelings. Otherwise, he’ll spend the day bouncing from one angry incident to the next. How can you break through his anger to release the tears and fears underneath? By building safety through play when he “misbehaves.” ref

When Your Child Hits You  

Staying calm when our child hurts us is almost impossible. Pain sends us immediately into our lower brain stem, which governs the “fight or flight” impulse, and our child immediately looks like the enemy. That automatically drops us onto “the low road” of parenting. You know the low road. It’s when you snarl at your child through clenched teeth, or start screaming, or become physically rough. When you lose all access to reason and feel justified in having your own little tantrum. ref

How To Handle Your Anger at Your Child  

All parents get angry at their children.

It doesn’t help that there are always the endless pressures of life: appointments we’re late to, things we’ve forgotten until the last moment, health and financial worries — the list is endless. In the middle of that hectic momentum, enter our child, who has lost her sneaker, suddenly remembered she needs a new notebook for school today, is teasing her little brother, or is downright belligerent. And we snap. ref

For Parents: Healing Yourself  

The bad news is that virtually all of us were wounded as children, and if we don’t heal those wounds, they prevent us from parenting our children optimally. If there’s an area where you were scarred as a child, you can count on that area causing you grief as a parent. But the good news is that being parents gives us an opportunity to heal ourselves. Most parents say that loving their children has transformed them: made them pore patient, more compassionate, more selfless. Our children have an unerring ability to show us our wounded places, they draw out our unreasonable fears and angers. Better than the best zen master or therapist, our children give us the perfect opportunity to grow and heal. Almost magically, as our wounds transform, we find that these hurt places inform us, motivate us, make us better parents. ref

WHAT IS POSITIVE DISCIPLINE?

Positive Discipline is a program designed to teach young people to become responsible, respectful and resourceful members of their communities. Based on the best selling Positive Discipline books by Dr. Jane Nelsen, Lynn Lott, Cheryl Erwin and others, it teaches important social and life skills in a manner that is deeply respectful and encouraging for both children and adults (including parents, teachers, childcare providers, youth workers, and others). Recent research tells us that children are “hardwired” from birth to connect with others, and that children who feel a sense of connection to their community, family, and school are less likely to misbehave. To be successful, contributing members of their community, children must learn necessary social and life skills. Positive Discipline is based on the understanding that discipline must be taught and that discipline also teaches. ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

FIVE CRITERIA FOR POSITIVE DISCIPLINE  

1. Helps children feel a sense of connection. (Belonging and significance)
2. Is mutually respectful and encouraging.  (Kind and firm at the same time.)
3. Is effective long – term. (Considers what the child is thinking, feeling, learning, and deciding about himself and his world – and what to do in the future to survive or to thrive.)
4. Teaches important social and life skills.  (Respect, concern for others, problem-solving, and cooperation as well as the skills to contribute to the home, school or larger community.)
5. Invites children to discover how capable they are.  (Encourages the constructive use of personal power and autonomy.) ref 

POSITIVE DISCIPLINE TOOLS

Positive Discipline Parenting and Classroom Management models are aimed at developing mutually respectful relationships. Positive Discipline teaches adults to employ kindness and firmness at the same time and is neither punitive nor permissive. The tools and concepts of Positive Discipline include:  

• Mutual respect.  Adults model firmness by respecting themselves and the needs of the situation, and kindness by respecting the needs of the child.
• Identifying the belief behind the behavior. Effective discipline recognizes the reasons kids do what they do and works to change those beliefs, rather than merely attempting to change behavior.
• Effective communication and problem-solving skills.
• Discipline that teaches (and is neither permissive nor punitive).
• Focusing on solutions instead of punishment.
• Encouragement (instead of praise). Encouragement notices effort and improvement, not just success, and builds long-term self-esteem and empowerment. ref 

Unique Characteristics of the Positive Discipline Model also include:

• Teaching adults and students through experiential activities. Creating an opportunity to practice new skills and to have fun learning by doing.
• Classroom discipline programs and parent education programs that are consistent. Parents, teachers, and childcare providers can work together to provide a secure, consistent environment for children.
• Inexpensive training and ongoing support so members of communities can teach each other Positive Discipline skills.
• Certified trainers across the country who can work with schools and communities. ref

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Attachment Parenting 

“Attachment is a deep and enduring emotional bond that connects one person to another across time and space (Ainsworth, 1973; Bowlby, 1969).  Attachment does not have to be reciprocal.  One person may have an attachment to an individual which is not shared.  Attachment is characterized by specific behaviors in children, such as seeking proximity to the attachment figure when upset or threatened (Bowlby, 1969). Attachment behavior in adults towards the child includes responding sensitively and appropriately to the child’s needs.  Such behavior appears universal across cultures. Attachment theory explains how the parent-child relationship emerges and influences subsequent development. Attachment theory in psychology originates with the seminal work of John Bowlby (1958).  In the 1930’s John Bowlby worked as a psychiatrist in a Child Guidance Clinic in London, where he treated many emotionally disturbed children.” ref 

“This experience led Bowlby to consider the importance of the child’s relationship with their mother in terms of their social, emotional and cognitive development.  Specifically, it shaped his belief about the link between early infant separations with the mother and later maladjustment, and led Bowlby to formulate his attachment theory. John Bowlby, working alongside James Robertson (1952) observed that children experienced intense distress when separated from their mothers.  Even when such children were fed by other caregivers, this did not diminish the child’s anxiety. These findings contradicted the dominant behavioral theory of attachment (Dollard and Miller, 1950) which was shown to underestimate the child’s bond with their mother.  The behavioral theory of attachment stated that the child becomes attached to the mother because she fed the infant. And Bowlby defined attachment as a ‘lasting psychological connectedness between human beings.’ (1969, p. 194)” ref 

“Bowlby (1958) proposed that attachment can be understood within an evolutionary context in that the caregiver provides safety and security for the infant. Attachment is adaptive as it enhances the infant’s chance of survival. This is illustrated in the work of Lorenz (1935) and Harlow (1958). According to Bowlby infants have a universal need to seek close proximity with their caregiver when under stress or threatened (Prior & Glaser, 2006). Most researchers believe that attachment develops through a series of stages. Psychologists have proposed two main theories that are believed to be important in forming attachments.” ref  

“The learning / behaviorist theory of attachment (e.g., Dollard & Miller, 1950) suggest that attachment is a set of learned behaviors.  The basis for the learning of attachments is the provision of food.  An infant will initially form an attachment to whoever feeds it. They learn to associate the feeder (usually the mother) with the comfort of being fed and through the process of classical conditioning, come to find contact with the mother comforting. They also find that certain behaviors (e.g., crying, smiling) bring desirable responses from others (e.g., attention, comfort), and through the process of operant conditioning  learn to repeat these behaviors to get the things they want.” ref 

Stages of Attachment 

Rudolph Schaffer and Peggy Emerson (1964) studied 60 babies at monthly intervals for the first 18 months of life (this is known as a longitudinal study). The children were all studied in their own home, and a regular pattern was identified in the development of attachment. The babies were visited monthly for approximately one year, their interactions with their carers were observed, and carers were interviewed.  A diary was kept by the mother to examine the evidence for the development of attachment. ref 

Three measures were recorded:

• Stranger Anxiety – response to the arrival of a stranger.
• Separation Anxiety – distress level when separated from a carer, the degree of comfort needed on return.
• Social Referencing – the degree a child looks at their carer to check how they should respond to something new (secure base). ref 

They discovered that baby’s attachments develop in the following sequence:

Asocial (0 – 6 weeks)

Very young infants are asocial in that many kinds of stimuli, both social and non-social, produce a favorable reaction, such as a smile. ref 

Indiscriminate Attachments (6 weeks to 7 months)

Infants indiscriminately enjoy human company, and most babies respond equally to any caregiver. They get upset when an individual ceases to interact with them. From 3 months infants smile more at familiar faces and can be easily comfortable by a regular caregiver. ref 

Specific Attachment (7 – 9 months)

Special preference for a single attachment figure.  The baby looks to particular people for security, comfort, and protection.  It shows fear of strangers (stranger fear) and unhappiness when separated from a special person (separation anxiety). Some babies show stranger fear and separation anxiety much more frequently and intensely than others, nevertheless, they are seen as evidence that the baby has formed an attachment.  This has usually developed by one year of age. ref 

Multiple Attachment (10 months and onwards)

The baby becomes increasingly independent and forms several attachments. By 18 months the majority of infants have formed multiple attachments. The results of the study indicated that attachments were most likely to form with those who responded accurately to the baby’s signals, not the person they spent more time with.  Schaffer and Emerson called this sensitive responsiveness. Intensely attached infants had mothers who responded quickly to their demands and, interacted with their child. Infants who were weakly attached had mothers who failed to interact. ref 

Many of the babies had several attachments by ten months old, including attachments to mothers, fathers, grandparents, siblings, and neighbors.  The mother was the main attachment figure for about half of the children at 18 months old and the father for most of the others. The most important fact in forming attachments is not who feeds and changes the child but who plays and communicates with him or her. Therefore, responsiveness appeared to be the key to attachment. ref 

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Understating the Growing Mind of a child: The 4 Stages of Cognitive Development 

Jean Piaget’s theory of cognitive development suggests that children move through four different stages of mental development. His theory focuses not only on understanding how children acquire knowledge, but also on understanding the nature of intelligence. Piaget’s stages are:

• Sensorimotor stage: birth to 2 years
• Preoperational stage: ages 2 to 7
• Concrete operational stage: ages 7 to 11
• Formal operational stage: ages 12 and up

Piaget believed that children take an active role in the learning process, acting much like little scientists as they perform experiments, make observations, and learn about the world. As kids interact with the world around them, they continually add new knowledge, build upon existing knowledge, and adapt previously held ideas to accommodate new information. ref 

The Stages

Through his observations of his children, Piaget developed a stage theory of intellectual development that included four distinct stages:

The Sensorimotor Stage

Ages: Birth to 2 Years

Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes:

• The infant knows the world through their movements and sensations
• Children learn about the world through basic actions such as sucking, grasping, looking, and listening
• Infants learn that things continue to exist even though they cannot be seen (object permanence)
• They are separate beings from the people and objects around them
• They realize that their actions can cause things to happen in the world around them

During this earliest stage of cognitive development, infants and toddlers acquire knowledge through sensory experiences and manipulating objects. A child’s entire experience at the earliest period of this stage occurs through basic reflexes, senses, and motor responses.

It is during the sensorimotor stage that children go through a period of dramatic growth and learning. As kids interact with their environment, they are continually making new discoveries about how the world works.

The cognitive development that occurs during this period takes place over a relatively short period of time and involves a great deal of growth. Children not only learn how to perform physical actions such as crawling and walking; they also learn a great deal about language from the people with whom they interact. Piaget also broke this stage down into a number of different substages. It is during the final part of the sensorimotor stage that early representational thought emerges.

Piaget believed that developing object permanence or object constancy, the understanding that objects continue to exist even when they cannot be seen, was an important element at this point of development.

By learning that objects are separate and distinct entities and that they have an existence of their own outside of individual perception, children are then able to begin to attach names and words to objects.  ref 

The Sensorimotor Stage of Cognitive Development

The Preoperational Stage

Ages: 2 to 7 Years

Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes:

• Children begin to think symbolically and learn to use words and pictures to represent objects.
• Children at this stage tend to be egocentric and struggle to see things from the perspective of others.
• While they are getting better with language and thinking, they still tend to think about things in very concrete terms.

The foundations of language development may have been laid during the previous stage, but it is the emergence of language that is one of the major hallmarks of the preoperational stage of development.

Children become much more skilled at pretend play during this stage of development, yet continue to think very concretely about the world around them. 

At this stage, kids learn through pretend play but still struggle with logic and taking the point of view of other people. They also often struggle with understanding the idea of constancy.
For example, a researcher might take a lump of clay, divide it into two equal pieces, and then give a child the choice between two pieces of clay to play with. One piece of clay is rolled into a compact ball while the other is smashed into a flat pancake shape. Since the flat shape looks larger, the preoperational child will likely choose that piece even though the two pieces are exactly the same size. ref 

Preoperational Stage of Cognitive Development in Young Children

The Concrete Operational Stage

Ages: 7 to 11 Years

Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes

• During this stage, children begin to thinking logically about concrete events
• They begin to understand the concept of conservation; that the amount of liquid in a short, wide cup is equal to that in a tall, skinny glass, for example
• Their thinking becomes more logical and organized, but still very concrete
• Children begin using inductive logic, or reasoning from specific information to a general principle

While children are still very concrete and literal in their thinking at this point in development, they become much more adept at using logic. The egocentrism of the previous stage begins to disappear as kids become better at thinking about how other people might view a situation.

While thinking becomes much more logical during the concrete operational state, it can also be very rigid. Kids at this point in development tend to struggle with abstract and hypothetical concepts.

During this stage, children also become less egocentric and begin to think about how other people might think and feel. Kids in the concrete operational stage also begin to understand that their thoughts are unique to them and that not everyone else necessarily shares their thoughts, feelings, and opinions. ref 

The Concrete Operational Stage in Cognitive Development

The Formal Operational Stage

Ages: 12 and Up

Major Characteristics and Developmental Changes:

• At this stage, the adolescent or young adult begins to think abstractly and reason about hypothetical problems
• Abstract thought emerges
• Teens begin to think more about moral, philosophical, ethical, social, and political issues that require theoretical and abstract reasoning
• Begin to use deductive logic, or reasoning from a general principle to specific information

The final stage of Piaget’s theory involves an increase in logic, the ability to use deductive reasoning, and an understanding of abstract ideas. At this point, people become capable of seeing multiple potential solutions to problems and think more scientifically about the world around them. The ability to thinking about abstract ideas and situations is the key hallmark of the formal operational stage of cognitive development. The ability to systematically plan for the future and reason about hypothetical situations are also critical abilities that emerge during this stage.  ref 

It is important to note that Piaget did not view children’s intellectual development as a quantitative process; that is, kids do not just add more information and knowledge to their existing knowledge as they get older. Instead, Piaget suggested that there is a qualitative change in how children think as they gradually process through these four stages. A child at age 7 doesn’t just have more information about the world than he did at age 2; there is a fundamental change in how he thinks about the world. ref  

Behavior Modification Methods: Positive vs. Negative

Spanking your kid is about as harmful as child abuse – The Boston Globe

Mike Nappier Spanking your kid is about as harmful as child abuse, according to a new 50-year study published in the Journal of Family Psychology. The analysis, which included research into spanking’s impact on approximately 160,000 children, linked repeated spankings to a number of “detrimental” outcomes for children later on in life, including increased mental health problems, cognitive difficulties, aggression, and antisocial behavior patterns. “We as a society think of spanking and physical abuse as distinct behaviors,” study author Elizabeth Gershoff of the University of Texas at Austin said in a news release. Gershoff worked alongside Andrew Grogan-Kaylor of the University of Michigan. “Yet our research shows that spanking is linked with the same negative child outcomes as abuse, just to a slightly lesser degree.” Gershoff and Grogan-Kaylor defined spanking as “an open-handed hit on the behind or extremities” in order to differentiate it from other forms of corporal punishment. Analyzing 17 separate detrimental behavioral outcomes that were observable in children throughout their development, the researchers found significant links between spanking and 13 of those outcomes. The pair said they hope their study will shed light on a particularly murky area of child-rearing, one some parents commend and others condemn. “Our analysis focuses on what most Americans would recognize as spanking and not on potentially abusive behaviors,” Gershoff said in the news release. “We found that spanking was associated with unintended detrimental outcomes, and was not associated with more immediate or long-term compliance, which are parents’ intended outcomes when they discipline their children.” Added Grogan-Kaylor, “Spanking thus does the opposite of what parents usually want it to do.” Conclusions drawn from a subset of studies comparing spanking to physical abuse were particularly troubling, with the researchers finding that both were linked to detrimental outcomes “that are similar in magnitude and identical in direction,” they wrote. This latest meta-analysis serves as a particularly damning piece of evidence against spanking, which has become increasingly controversial around the world over the past few decades. A recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report blasted spanking, along with other forms of corporal punishment, calling for legislative reform and a strengthening of education campaigns in hopes of reducing physical child abuse. And yet, spanking is still common around the world, with a 2010 UNICEF report concluding that as many as 80 percent of parents employ the practice in their households. Gershoff notes that, despite its prevalence, there’s no clear evidence spanking does anything positive for kids — but plenty of evidence that it can actively harm their development. “We hope that our study can help educate parents about the potential harms of spanking and prompt them to try positive and non-punitive forms of discipline,” she said. 

Spanking your kid is about as harmful as child abuse – The Boston Globe

“Is your child old enough to use reason? No, then they aren’t old enough to understand why you are hitting them. Yes? Then use reason. Stop hitting your child, asshole.”

I have head it said that some people think wrongly that spanking is not abuse, period.

Ok, so, I ask you, what doctor told you that there are different types of hitting the skin where some hitting is not hitting? Or a psychological professional, tell you that spanking never causes the same psychological abuse as other types of abuse so it is not harmful at all? Evidence, please.“Damien, have you ever been a victim of abuse outside of your father hitting you with a 2×4 once or twice? Have you been abused after that….I mean truly abused? Have you been pissed on, beat on, treated like shit, or possibly locked in a room without the possibility of escape? Have you been assaulted just because you were there? Were you treated like you are an invalid person just because you’re alive? Those are abuse situations. A spanking isn’t abuse. So were you just being spanked or actually abused?” – Challenger My response, well, yes I was only once hit by a 2×4 but I was abused many times and in many ways as a child: physically, sexually, psychologically, mal-nourished, mal-clothed, mal-sheltered, medical neglect, educational neglect, abandoned, and a harmful cult religious upbringing.

Positive Parenting Info

• Anti-Spanking: http://www.nospank.net/
• Positive Discipline: http://www.ahaparenting.com/parenting-tools/Discipline
• Positive Discipline: http://www.positivediscipline.org
• Peaceful Discipline: http://peacefulparentsconfidentkids.com/category/peaceful-discipline/
• Peaceful Discipline: http://www.parentingpeacefully.com/
• Nonaggression Parenting: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/promoting-empathy-your-teen/201312/taking-non-aggressive-approach-towards-discipline
• Stop yelling: http://theorangerhino.com/
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.atheistparents.org/
• Atheist Parenting: http://parentingbeyondbelief.com/blog/
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.wikihow.com/Be-an-Atheist-Parent
• Atheist Parenting: http://raisingfreethinkers.com/
• Atheist Parenting: https://raisingaskeptic.wordpress.com/
• Atheist Parenting: http://atheistfoundation.org.au/article/atheist-parenting/
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/In-Beginning-Creation-Stories-Around/dp/0152387420
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Humanism-Parents-Parenting-Without-Religion/dp/1430314257/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456258318&sr=8-1&keywords=Humanism+for+Parents
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Let-Kids-Drink-Kool-Aid/dp/1596981512/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456258452&sr=8-1&keywords=Don%27t+Let+the+Kids+Drink+the+Kool-Aid
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Growing-Up-Godless-Parents-Religion/dp/1454910984/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1456258553&sr=8-1&keywords=Growing+Up+Godless
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Parenting-Without-God-Intelligent-Religious/dp/1634310446/ref=pd_sim_14_3?ie=UTF8&dpID=41Y0rISdQBL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR107%2C160_&refRID=0QX0EQ7C400JVEEXF2EV
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Secular-Parenting-Religious-World-Free-thinking/dp/149930918X/ref=pd_sim_14_5?ie=UTF8&dpID=51Et6TFd7OL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR107%2C160_&refRID=11QZSZ1P8XCYG0AGGHWD
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/One-World-Many-Beliefs-Nonbelievers/dp/0615641482/ref=pd_sim_14_6?ie=UTF8&dpID=41ICF89qLCL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=0CREN0JC4856PZ3GAC3R
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/What-about-Skeptics-Bookshelf-Series/dp/0879751061/ref=pd_sim_14_6?ie=UTF8&dpID=51hdbZ2JaqL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR106%2C160_&refRID=13CW2P2QR4RJEQAVF30F
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Maybe-Yes-No-Dan-Barker/dp/0879756071/ref=pd_sim_14_1?ie=UTF8&dpID=51SlYPTRa2L&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR107%2C160_&refRID=05JVAJKBZ418XZQ93RZ2
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Humanism-Whats-That-Book-Curious/dp/1591023874/ref=pd_sim_14_7?ie=UTF8&dpID=51w4Ik1p6BL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR104%2C160_&refRID=1ZHZ0ZFH77656SJNC906
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/The-Belief-Book-David-McAfee/dp/1908675314/ref=pd_sim_14_23?ie=UTF8&dpID=51kzhiSgeyL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR105%2C160_&refRID=1ZHZ0ZFH77656SJNC906
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Tiny-Thinkers-Tortoise-MJ-Mouton/dp/0692548270/ref=pd_sim_14_6?ie=UTF8&dpID=51-LkIIdAPL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=1ETBCF4R36X74BP2GH05
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Awkward-Moments-Childrens-Bible-Vol/dp/149217744X/ref=pd_sim_14_12?ie=UTF8&dpID=61wJkb19F4L&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=1VP0XEZNAHKGQJ125ZEX
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Little-Changes-Tiffany-Taylor/dp/1482559986/ref=pd_sim_14_48?ie=UTF8&dpID=51nZze%2BlLfL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=159J3EY5G1K8TBJ7HMXA
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Our-Family-Tree-Evolution-Story/dp/0152017720/ref=pd_sim_14_3?ie=UTF8&dpID=61Bb8PVIFPL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR152%2C160_&refRID=13DM7FFZZYSQJ7F9PHXS
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Im-An-Atheist-And-Thats/dp/1497363675/ref=pd_sim_14_5?ie=UTF8&dpID=51xDud8UxeL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR160%2C160_&refRID=1AP0ECCV7MGVX5CWZRRE
• Atheist Parenting: http://www.amazon.com/Grandmother-Fish-Childs-First-Evolution/dp/1250113237/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1456260147&sr=1-1&keywords=grandmother+fish
• Atheist Parenting: https://www.facebook.com/AtheistParentsPlace/
• Atheist Parenting: http://jezebel.com/godless-parents-are-doing-a-better-job-1682844001
• Anti-circumcision: http://www.intactamerica.org/
• Attachment Parenting: http://www.simplypsychology.org/attachment.html
• Breastfeeding: http://www.llli.org/

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope’s Art

Damien Marie AtHope (Said as “At” “Hope”)/(Autodidact Polymath but not good at math):

Axiological Atheist, Anti-theist, Anti-religionist, Secular Humanist, Rationalist, Writer, Artist, Jeweler, Poet, “autodidact” Philosopher, schooled in Psychology, and “autodidact” Armchair Archaeology/Anthropology/Pre-Historian (Knowledgeable in the range of: 1 million to 5,000/4,000 years ago). I am an anarchist socialist politically. Reasons for or Types of Atheism

My Website, My Blog, & Short-writing or Quotes, My YouTube, Twitter: @AthopeMarie, and My Email: damien.marie.athope@gmail.com