To Spank or Not to Spank
Let’s talk about a subject that is both controversial and not controversial at all. What I mean is that, for most therapists, psychologists, and behavioral professionals, this is not controversial at all. However, for some parents, there is a grey area here. I know a lot of people who say they were spanked as kids and it taught them to stay in line. A common refrain I hear from these people is, “well, I turned out just fine.” However, I’d like to examine this a bit more objectively to gain a better understanding as to why this practice is ineffective and why other methods may prove to be a more effective substitute.
If you are a parent, or want to become a parent, and you think spanking is fine and the preferred way to teach discipline, I am not here to tell you that you are a bad parent. I’m not here to tell you that you are a bad person. I’m here to try to start a discussion, and all I would ask is that you approach this with an open mind.
Diving In
Let’s start here: why do people want to spank their children? The answer to that is usually, “because it gets results fast.” I’ve heard parents say, “I want to put the fear of God in my child.” But think about this: would you rather your kids fear you or respect you? Parenting is much like being a leader. Would you rather your followers fear you or respect you?
Niccolo Machiavelli, the famous early 16th century political philosopher wrote, “it is better to be feared than loved if you cannot be both.” And there has actually been a decent amount of research done on this specific topic, both for politics with leading people and in business with leading employees The general consensus is that this idiom is absolutely true… in the short term, only in the short term.
Firstly, fear stifles creativity and initiative. If you are afraid of your boss, why are you going to present an idea? Why are you going to put yourself in the spotlight just to be criticized? Secondly, fear teaches people to do something to protect themselves, not because they respect the ideas of the delegator. In other words, if you are asked to do something, you will do it, but only so you don’t get in trouble, not because you buy into the idea. Fear ultimately makes you stop respecting the person in charge. If you don’t respect the person in charge and they aren’t around to criticize/berate you, why would you follow the rules they’ve created that you don’t respect in the first place? Conversely, if you respect the person in charge, you will still do what they ask when they aren’t around because you have bought into the idea; you respect that person.
Relate this to children. Do we want to stifle our kids’ creativity and initiative? Do we want them purposefully holding their tongues because they’re afraid to be punished for telling us something? This should be the very opposite of what we want. We don’t want our kids hiding things from us, especially if they are facing something that could be dangerous for them. We don’t want our kids to start losing respect for us.
Again, there has been a lot of research done on this over the last number of decades, so we have some strong and established data to reference. Now, you may have been spanked as a child and have not experienced these outcomes, but do not simply dismiss these ideas on account of your singular experience. These are the consequences that decades of data suggest are expected because it is constant across many studies and experiences.
What the Studies Suggest
Firstly, have you noticed that some kids are more sensitive than others? Some people just have higher pain tolerances than others. To some degree, this “toughness” can be taught. I think sports can be good for teaching us how to be tough. Playing outside, running around, playing in the dirt, there are some very good qualities about being tough. And when we talk about spanking, people will say, “we aren’t physically scarring the kid.”
The problem is that for some kids, this can literally be very traumatic. And trauma is mental scarring. It’s one thing to teach a person to be tough through a game, a sport, or play when they are having fun and enjoying themselves. It’s another thing when the person is frightened and possibly terrified. Many psychologists will tell you they have had adult clients who were traumatized from a punishment given to them. Now, I understand some will say, “well they learned their lesson. They aren’t supposed to do that thing. Now they know the consequences.” But, can we teach them why they shouldn’t be doing that thing, so they understand they shouldn’t do that without being mentally scarred?
While spanking does not necessarily constitute trauma in all people, we return to our original question here: why would you want to take a chance, any chance at all, at traumatizing your children? Further, another consequence of using spanking for discipline is in the conflict resolution techniques of the children. The data suggest that children who are spanked are more likely to try to solve their problems with physical violence than kids who are not spanked.
What do most parents say when they are going to spank their kid? “This is going to hurt me more than it will you. I don’t want to do this, but you gave me no choice.” Think about what that is implying. Researchers have found that kids who get spanked start having a mindset of, “I deserve this. Mommy or Daddy says I have to be spanked. I deserve to be hit.” If that’s what you believe, you are going to start losing your confidence. With lower confidence comes a bevy of real-world problems in addition to the mental stress: lower grades, social issues, lack of interest in things, the list goes on.
On a related note, researchers have also found that the kids who get spanked have a higher possibility of being bullied or becoming a bully. This makes complete sense when you realize that not only do these kids have lowered confidence, but they’ve also learned to solve their problems with physical force. On the flip side, if the child has the mindset that they deserve to be physically or verbally assaulted, they will not stand up for themselves and inevitably become the bullied.
What we are also finding is that kids who have more disciplinary issues usually have lower emotional intelligence. If we can help them understand emotional intelligence, we can usually help them improve their behavior. However, spanking a child is really confusing for them, and can stunt the growth of their emotional intelligence.
When you spank a child, what is going through their head? Do you think they’re thinking “hmm… you know, I should really think about what I did wrong. Yup, I shouldn’t have done the thing dad just told me not to do.” THEY AREN’T THINKING THAT. If you are about to be spanked, you are most likely panicking. If you are having any thoughts, you would probably be thinking, this person who is much bigger than me, stronger than me, and who is supposed to protect me and says they LOVE me is now beating on me, smacking me, hitting me… but they love me? How are they protecting me? Do you see how this could be confusing to a 4-year-old or a 6-year-old?
Now, obviously there is going to be distress linked to any type of discipline. Whether it’s losing electronics or going in time out, the consequences are not welcomed by the recipient. That’s what makes it discipline. However, I don’t want the distress to be so overpowering that it conflicts with learning and understanding.
Let’s talk about another negative consequence of spanking. As we already talked about, being spanked makes it more likely for these children to become bullies or be bullied down the road. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that kids who are spanked are more likely to be in abusive relationship down the road. It is no different than the bullying scenario. If this person believes their problems can be solved using physical violence, they will be the abusive one. Meanwhile, if they believe that they deserve to be hit, disciplined, and assaulted, they will likely become the abused.
Disclaimer
Now this is extremely important. I am not saying you shouldn’t discipline your kids. Not at all. You need to discipline your kids. You need to be a parent. But there is a difference between punishment and discipline. Let me say that again. THERE IS A DIFFERENCE between punishing and discipline. The word discipline comes from the Latin Di Scipulus (discipulus), meaning “pupil.” This is also where we get the word “disciple” from. Think about the fact that the word “discipline” comes from the narrative of wanting to teach, to instruct, to train, to educate. Again, what is our goal with this? A parent who is punishing their kid will say, “I LOVE my kid, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE my kid. They did something wrong and I can’t keep having them do this thing or it could be very bad for them in the future. And YES!!! That’s it!!! You LOVE your kid! You don’t want them to do this thing again and you want them to change their behavior.
See, sometimes when we spank, punishment can turn into this “serving justice” dynamic. Sometimes you might punish for payback and it could even feel good. Your kid was a terror and now justice is being served. But under these circumstances, you are using punishment as payback, as a sort of revenge. If you want your kid crawling back to you begging for your forgiveness, then it’s about a power trip and you need to check your ego. This shouldn’t be about power or payback or revenge. This should be about love, and helping our kids learn from their mistakes.
Ultimately, punishment is about inflicting physical and/or mental suffering for past behavior and transgressions. Punishment teaches the emotional brain to fear and can lead to mental issues. Discipline, on the other hand, focuses on teaching, and changing future desired behaviors.
How Should I Teach Discipline, Then?
Now that is a great question! This is a complex and dynamic topic because this really can change from child to child. What works great for one kid might not be as effective for another kid. And that’s honestly why I think parents like spanking… the answer is easy. Most kids respond to spanking right away. It’s a simple and straightforward concept: you do X, you get Y. But discipline that comes from a place of love will be much more effective in the long run, and without these negative side effects. That said, it does require more work. It’s going to take more time. Parents, you are going to need more patience and discipline. That’s right, you need discipline to teach discipline.
I’m going to put together some other podcasts on teaching discipline, because it’s such an important subject. We can spend a lot of time on this. The most important thing though, is that if a form of discipline isn’t working for your kid, don’t give up. This can be frustrating; this can be hard, but there are effective ways to discipline. You just have to keep trying different parenting tactics until you find something that does work. And hopefully I can try to help you find some parenting tactics and tools that can help with this.
The last thing that I want to leave you with is this: over the years, I have worked with literally thousands of kids. I’m not saying this to brag. I’m saying this to give you hope. In my now 20+ years of teaching experience, having worked with literally thousands of kids, any parent who has seen me working with their kid, even for just a short amount of time, knows and has seen me, earn their child’s respect. I absolutely teach them discipline, and I have done this without spanking ANY of them. It can be done.