Monday, October 09, 2006

Interesting Article

Did anyone see the Smacking study hits at claims of harm article in the weekend herald? check it out... it is very interesting!

The Herald don't leave their links up for long so I'll copy some of the interesting bits.

Children who are smacked lightly with an open hand on the bottom, hand or leg do much the same in later life as those who are not smacked, found the Dunedin multidisciplinary health and development study, which has tracked 1000 children since they were born in the city in 1972-73.

…lead author of the physical punishment part of the Dunedin study, psychologist Jane Millichamp, said the project appeared to be the first long-term study in the world to separate out those who had merely been smacked with an open hand.--Preliminary analysis showed that those who were merely smacked had "similar or even slightly better outcomes" than those who were not smacked in terms of aggression, substance abuse, adult convictions and school achievement.

"Study members in the 'smacking only' category of punishment appeared to be particularly high-functioning and achieving members of society," she said.--"I have looked at just about every study I can lay my hands on, and there are thousands, and I have not found any evidence that an occasional mild smack with an open hand on the clothed behind or the leg or hand is harmful or instils violence in kids," she said.

"I know that is not a popular thing to say, but it is certainly the case.

"The more honest researchers have said, let's be honest, we all wish we could say it's all very clear and that no parent should ever lift a finger on a child - although I think that is totally unrealistic as a single parent myself - but the big problem is that a lot of the studies have lumped a whole lot of forms of physical punishment together."

2 comments:

Andy said...

It's good to see that The Herald isn't afraid to publish the obvious facts! Hebrews 12:11 No discipline seems pleasent at the time, but painful. Later on however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. Here's the Bible speaking on the subject, backing up the results of that research in Dunedin.

Jonathan said...

There was also an article in the second section which had a couple of different views on the matter. One was from a single mum who didn't smack her children and 1 was a couple (from our church) who do use the odd smack.

It was interesting that they seemed to find it difficult to find someone who said would never use any physical force at all.