Is physical punishment a justifiable method of discipling children?

Answer 1

This seemed to work well back about 40 years. Spanking was permitted by the school principal - those who 'got it' never EVER stepped out of line again.

From a personal view - my father had this 4" wide leather belt that he wore everyday. When I stepped out of line - only happened once - I could hear that belt being removed from the belt loops ... he doubled the belt and I was swatted three times ... could not sit down for the next three hours ... sent to bed without dinner ... well, needless to say, I became very fearful of that leather belt and never stepped out of line ever again!!

Kids then had this horrible fear of this happening to them ... nowadays there is no fear whatsoever - just raise a hand against a child and the kid calls 911 and are in jail within minutes ... Sometimes wonder if society has made all the right choices over the years.

Another point of view:When you say corporal punishment, you're talking about Negative Reinforcement in a psychological sense: behavior modification as a result of a negative inducement, most often pain. Before one examines the morality of this, let's take a look at a practical question: does it work?

Example: When one uses pain to train a puppy to not eliminate inside the house, the foremost problems one confronts are making certain the puppy knows exactly why it's being punished, so as to modify its behavior, and also to somehow convey the message that this negative reinforcement will Only occur when the puppy performs an act we'd like to change. This is extremely hard with youngsters, canine or human, as it's hard to link the exact cause (pooping in the house) to the effect (pain as a result). It's easy for immature animals and humans to get this very confused and, if they don't get the association exactly right, two things happen: You're causing pain for what appears to be no reason, so you're a threat. And you may be reinforcing a reaction based on another unrelated stimulus: for instance, if the puppy scratches its ear, then eliminates, how do you show the puppy that the stimulus that caused the pain response wasn't ear scratching?

Another consequence is that the administrator of punishment gets feared and perceived to some extent as an enemy, which makes any other messages they deliver of questionable voracity to the subject. If you physically punish an entity often, it's almost certain that one of the stimulus/response links you'll form is, "They enter the room and I get hurt!" Not effective.

Generally speaking, negative reinforcement is avoided in almost all training scenarios, with both animals and humans. Boot Camp, for instance, was particularly brutal before WW-II. Since then, stringent limits on what a Drill Instructor is allowed to do have been imposed. And we now say that our armed forces are the best trained that they've ever been. So reduction or elimination of negative reinforcement has had a marked positive effect.

Lastly, in extreme cases -- recidivist violent criminals for instance, we see a HUGE break in the ability to perceive the relationship between cause and effect. And we relate this symptom to a lack of empathy. This is why States with capital punishment statutes still in effect are not seeing markedly reduced murder rates. The reason most people don't commit murder is not that there's a punishment that they fear; the reason is they empathize sufficiently to not Want to murder. Those that don't have that empathy don't make that connection, and so we see that, whatever the long term solution to violent crime is, it's not going to be negative conditioning.

If you who are reading this suffered negative reinforcement or physical punishment, and find yourself to be law-abiding, I ask you an honest question: Is the reason you're a reliable, good citizen today the result of being beaten? Or is it because of who you are and what you want?

In summary, many sources deeply question the efficacy of negative reinforcement; it seems that it apparently doesn't work.

Answer 2

Physical punishment is not an effective or recommended method of disciplining children. It can have long-term negative effects on a child's mental and emotional well-being, and there are more constructive and positive discipline strategies that can be used to teach children appropriate behavior. It is important to focus on promoting positive reinforcement, setting clear boundaries, and teaching through communication and understanding.