Harmful Effects of Spanking Disappear With Better Research Methods
A new summary of the best research on disciplinary spanking was just published in this month’s issue of Child Development,1 the prestigious journal of the Society for Research in Child Development. It demonstrates that:
a.) non-abusive spanking has minimal, if any, effect on children's antisocial aggression.
b.) whether spanking appears to be helpful or harmful depends on the statistical method used to analyze the data.
This research is important because two professional organizations have recently claimed that parents should never spank their children. If non-abusive spanking is harmful enough for pediatricians and psychologists to issue a public warning, harmful effects should be evident using the best research methods, not just methods that would make hospitals appear to be harmful. (People in hospitals have worse illnesses than people not in hospitals, but that does not mean that hospitals are making them ill.) Studies of spanking and possible replacements for spanking must therefore account for preexisting differences which make some children more difficult to discipline than others.
The new summary combined data from the best existing studies on spanking. It analyzed the data using two standard methods of documenting change in aggression. It showed tiny average effects of spanking on subsequent child aggression. Whether spanking appeared harmful or beneficial depended on the statistical method used.
Bad (or good) effects of spanking that show up only in statistical tests known to be biased are likely a statistical artifact of that method, not evidence of a true effect.
I had a chance to interview Chris Ferguson to learn more.
What was the catalyst behind this research?
We've seen it very commonly reported in the press by some scholars and professional guilds (like the American Academy of Pediatrics) that there is clear evidence linking spanking to a whole host of negative outcomes from aggression to adult heart disease. We wanted to examine whether this was an accurate portrayal of the research evidence. At present it seems that this is not the case. In fact, looking only at non-abusive spanking, the evidence is weak linking such parenting practices to negative behavioral outcomes in kids. We're not so much advocating for spanking, but we are concerned that some elements of the scholarly community have over advertised and misstated the strength of the evidence for the harmfulness of spanking.
Why is it so important for parents to be aware of the research surrounding spanking?
As noted above, there has been a lot of bad information and dubious claims out there in the news media, many of them created by scholars or professional guilds. Spanking research is probably another example of agenda-driven research where moral entrepreneurship appears to matter more than does a critical consideration of actual data. Unfortunately, this is a common issue with much of social science research which naturally tends to cross many moral, emotional and political lines in our lives. Given that psychology more generally is experiencing a "replication crisis" it is probably wise for parents to be cautious about accepting blanket statements of effects, particularly when implying consistent evidence. We can say for sure the evidence regarding spanking does not match many of the claims out there. It would be good for parents to be critical consumers of research claims and wary of "advice" from professional guilds like the AAP, which often have been of poor quality.
How can parents use appropriate forms of discipline with their children?
That's a great question. I think one thing to consider is that in the ratio of praise to punishment, parents generally want to put as much emphasis on positives as possible. This doesn't mean punishments should never be used, but rather that it's important for kids to feel loved, valued and know they do many things right. One of the things I've found in some of my own research is that what predicts some problems in kids is less physical punishment their exposed to and more not feeling loved, or experiencing verbal abuse or neglect. Naturally, that should not be an excuse for physical abuse, nor am I advocating non-abusive spanking either. But setting as positive a home environment, emotionally, as possible for kids is an important part of their developmental success.
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1. Larzelere RE, Gunnoe ML, Ferguson CJ. Improving causal inferences in meta-analyses of longitudinal studies: Spanking as an illustration. Child Development. 2018;89(6):2038-2050. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cdev.13097
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