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By Serena Gordon<\/b>
HealthDay Reporter<\/i><\/p>\n
MONDAY, July 27, 2020 (HealthDay News)<\/p>\n
American kids have something to celebrate: Spanking has hit a new low.<\/p>\n
About one in three parents said they spanked their kids in 2017 compared to 50% in 1993, new research shows.<\/p>\n
“Fewer parents are spanking, and I think it’s helpful for people to know that and that there are tools that are more effective than spanking,” said Christopher Mehus, lead author of a new study. He’s a researcher with the Institute for Translational Research in Children’s Mental Health<\/a> in Minneapolis.<\/p>\n But Mehus isn’t looking to shame parents who still rely on corporal punishment.<\/p>\n “Parenting<\/a> is one of the hardest jobs there is, and there’s no education and training for parents,” he said. “We really need to do a better job at supporting parents and setting them up for success with alternative parenting<\/a> strategies.”<\/p>\n The American Academy of Pediatrics<\/a>‘ (AAP) policy on discipline says spanking isn’t an effective way to discipline a child. It may even backfire by teaching a child to be more aggressive. The AAP advises parents to avoid it. It suggests that they instead set rules and expectations and reward good behavior.<\/p>\n To gauge what effect — if any — experts’ advice to avoid spanking had on its use, Mehus and his colleague, Megan Patrick, looked at annual rates of spanking over 25 years.<\/p>\n The study included more than 16,000 parents at age 35. All were living with a 2- to 12-year-old child and 86% were married. About 42% had a college degree. Slightly more than half were women, and more than three-quarters were white people.<\/p>\n The parents were asked how often they spanked their kids.<\/p>\n Spanking declined by 15 percentage points over the 25-year period. The decline was similar for women and men, though slightly higher for men, the researchers said.<\/p>\n Parents of 2- to 4-year-olds saw an even bigger shift — their use of corporal punishment dropped from 60% to 39%, according to the report published online as a letter in the July 27 JAMA Pediatrics<\/a><\/i>.<\/p>\n Dr. Michael Grosso, chief medical officer and acting chair of pediatrics at Huntington Hospital in Huntington, N.Y., reviewed the results.<\/p>\n “This finding aligns well with the position of the American Academy of Pediatrics and what most of us, as pediatricians, try to reinforce as part of our anticipatory guidance: There is no reason for and no value in corporal punishment in child-rearing,” Grosso said.<\/p>\n Spanking can teach a young child that physical violence against another person is acceptable, Grosso said. This is true whether spanking is carried out dispassionately as a planned intervention or as an expression of anger, he added.<\/p>\n “It is very good news that the incidence of this behavior — either because of our advice or for other societal reasons — is clearly in the decline,” Grosso said.<\/p>\n So what’s a better approach?<\/p>\n Mehus, father of a 4-year-old, said timeouts can be helpful when used in a particular way.<\/p>\n “Timeout should be a short, five-minute break in a safe place, near a parent. A timeout gives everyone involved a chance to take a breath,” he said.<\/p>\n Mehus said it’s important for parents to plan for situations and to let a child know ahead of time what they expect and what the consequences will be if they misbehave.<\/p>\n Parents need to have realistic expectations, too. “If children listen 80% of the time, that’s really great,” Mehus said.<\/p>\n![\"MedicalNews\"](\"https:\/\/images.medicinenet.com\/images\/HealthDay\/healthday.png\")
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