A discussion of whether corporal punishment is harmful to children physically and emotionally.
This paper evaluates the issue of corporal punishment or for the purpose of the paper, spanking and slapping and attempts to evaluate whether or not it is true that corporal punishment is harmful to children not only from a moral or ethical point of view but also from a purely pragmatic one. It examines attitudes between different cultural and socioeconomic groups as well as the attitude of the medical profession through analysis of surveys. It also discusses the issue of whether children spanked as a child more likely to spank their own children.
“Many people ” those who are opponents of all forms of corporal punishment ” believe that even such relatively mild forms of physical punishment as spanking are in fact forms of child abuse. The strongest opponents of corporal punishment consider the use of physical force to be not only morally wrong but also counterproductive. Opponents of corporal punishment tend to believe that spanking and other forms of physical punishment make children more aggressive as well as less well adjusted socially conditions that tend to exacerbate whatever behavior it was that prompted the spanking or slapping to begin with. This means that this unwanted behavior is likely to reoccur in an even more exaggerated form and be even harder to stop.”