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Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Family Studies and Human Services / Sandra Stith and Jared Durtschi / Controversy still exists in whether parents should or should not use corporal punishment to discipline their young children. The aim of this study was to investigate whether corporal punishment when the child was two years old predicted child externalizing behaviors a year later, and whether or not this association was moderated by parents’ observed positivity and harshness towards their child. A total of 218 couples and their first born child were selected for this study from the Family Transition Project (FTP) data set. Findings indicated that frequency of fathers’ corporal punishment when the child was two years old predicted child externalizing behaviors a year later, while controlling for initial levels of child externalizing behavior. Also, it was found that observed positive parenting and observed harsh parenting moderated the relationship between corporal punishment and child externalizing behaviors. These results highlight the importance of continuing to examine the efficacy of a commonly used form of discipline (i.e., corporal punishment). Furthermore, this study suggests that the parental climate in which corporal punishment is used may also be important to consider because parental positivity and harshness attenuate and amplify, respectively, the association of corporal punishment with child externalizing. Implications for family therapy are offered.

Fifteen women and five men participated in a study aimed at devising strategies to reduce the use of physical punishment in New Zealand. The potential problems with the use of physical punishment, the extent of its use in New Zealand, and the likelihood of intergenerational transmission are discussed to justify the aim of the study. The participants were all parents who had been smacked themselves, but who had decided not to smack their own children. Their ages ranged from 28 to 57, and only three had less than some tertiary education. They were from various ethnic backgrounds; fourteen had an occupation other than parenting, and nine were single parents. The participants had broken the intergenerational cycle of physical punishment: they had been smacked themselves but did not smack their own children. All participated in an individual, semi-structured interview, in which their childhood physical punishment, their decision not to smack, the maintenance of that decision, and their use of alternative disciplinary techniques were discussed. Four participated in a focus group, in which the strategies suggested in the interviews were discussed and refined to produce a final list of recommendations. The parents made a conscious decision against smacking, which involved a particular experience that prompted them to consider their disciplinary practices. Negative views of smacking (ineffective, modelling violence, and potential to escalate) were also helpful in making the decision. While maintaining their decision was usually easy, alternative techniques were sometimes hard to use, though effective in the long term. Some had to deal with the effects of deviating from a childrearing norm, particularly in regard to other family members. While many were satisfied that their own children were free from physical punishment, some had actively tried to convince other parents not to use it as well. They recommended strategies aimed at achieving the goals of parent education, raising awareness, reducing strain, and increasing support for parents. They also suggested practical steps that individual parents who were interested in breaking the cycle of physical punishment could take. The limitations and strengths of the study are discussed, as well as the implications for further research. The study demonstrates that parenting without physical punishment is effective, desirable, and achievable, even by parents who were smacked themselves. It presents a number of possible strategies and intermediate goals, for interventions at a national, community, or individual level, which aim to reduce the use of physical punishment.

The current study examined the relation between parental empathy, parenting aggression and child maladjustment in a group of parents who perpetrated child abuse and neglect. Twenty parents who were court mandated to receive a parenting intervention program at the Nest Center for Women, Children, and Families participated in this research study. Information about parental dispositional empathy, parent-child specific empathy, parenting aggression and child internalizing and externalizing symptoms were collected through an interview with the parents. Parents in this study reported high levels of dispositional empathy, but exhibited low to moderate levels of empathy in a parent-child relationship rated by coders. Parents also reported low levels of parenting aggression across psychological aggression, corporal punishment and psychological control. Examining the relation between parental empathy and aggressive parenting revealed that parent-child specific empathy, but not dispositional empathy, was negatively associated with parental psychological control. In a subsample of older children in middle childhood and adolescence, parental affective dispositional empathy was negatively associated with child externalizing symptoms. The current study links parental empathy to parental psychological control and emphasizes the importance of examining empathy in a specific relationship in addition to dispositional empathy.

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For many decades, violence that is perpetuated by parents and loved ones against children in the name of physical child discipline or corporal punishment, has been a major concern for various governments and church leaders among most nations of the world. This does not only take into account hitting or beating a child with a stick, belt, slapping, or choking, but also spanking; especially when it is aggressive or excessive (Bradshaw 2009; Straus 1994; Kanyandago in Waruta & Kinoti 2005, Wolfe 1991; Carl 1985). A very prominent and highly respected religious figure, here in South Africa, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, made the following notable assertion to show his support towards the elimination of the practice of corporal punishment in the home: I support the Global Initiative to eliminate all corporal punishment at home, at school, in institutions and community. … Progress towards abolishing corporal punishment is being made, but millions of the world’s children still suffer from humiliating acts of violence and these violations …can have serious lifelong effects. Violence begets violence and we shall reap whirlwind. Children can be disciplined without violence that instills fear and misery, and I look forward to church communities working with other organizations to… make progress towards ending all forms of violence against children. If we really want a peaceful and compassionate world, we need to build communities of trust where all children are respected, where home and school are safe places to be and where discipline is taught by example” (http://www.rapcan.org.za/wgpd/documents: Waterhouse 2012. Retrieved 23th February 2013). However, in spite of the various voices and movements against corporal punishment of children; especially the aggressive form of this practice (as will be analyzed later on in this study), the practice is still a common phenomenon in many African countries, including South Africa. Furthermore, as some research studies have shown, a literalistic view of certain texts of Scriptures in the OT (which are mostly from the Book of Proverbs) do not only seem to influence the widespread of corporal punishment of children, but also the abuse of this form of physical discipline (e.g., Prov. 13:24; 22:15; 23:13-14, 22:15) (Bradshaw 2009; Capps 1995; Straus 1994; Greven 1991). This assumption seems plausible, seeing that as Tripp T & Tripp M (2008:138) rightly allude to, as Christians, “God’s Word is our rule for faith and practice.” The authors, also expressed that, “the Biblical laws and standards sound oppressive and strict in our lawless, arrogant, twenty-first century culture.” However, it is important to also acknowledge that we, as Christians, can be wrong in our interpretation and application of certain Scriptures; thereby, leading to flawed practices (Pohlmann 2007; Pollard 1997). As Pollard (1997:91) has rightly observed, “Clearly, both personal experience and church history teach us that we can be wrong. It is vital, then, that we have a genuine humility as Christians. We must recognize our fallibility, and constantly reassess what we believe.” In other words, there are many well-meaning Christian parents who have put their children in harm’s way by frequently administering spanking to them in ways that are, evidently, excessive or aggressive: while claiming that they are obeying scriptural injunction on child discipline, and are also doing it for the moral and ethical good of their children (Bradshaw 2009; Greven 1991). The researcher, himself, was brought up in a Christian home; where the use and abuse of both high violence (e.g., beating a child with belt, stick, etc) and low violence (e.g., forcefully beating a child with bear hand) methods of physical child discipline were the order of the day (or a frequent occurrence). Furthermore, his well-meaning father often seemed to find justification for his actions based on scriptural grounds. Incidentally, the researcher noticed that this form of child discipline also seems to be widely used by many parents in his local church and many other Christian parents, whom he has come in contact with. And many of these parents seem not to be aware of the immediate and long term negative effects that aggressive corporeal punishment has on their children. The widespread of this phenomenon (corporeal punishment of children) and the traumatic impact it has on children, has led the researcher to do this research study in his local church context (a Pentecostal church), and to develop/propose a biblically sound or balanced model of pastoral care that can help pastors in rendering effective care, to those faced with this problem situation within the church. The theoretical frame work of this research study is based on Pollard’s model of positive deconstruction, as well as some contributions from Straus’ book Beating the Devil out of Them; Corporal Punishment in American Families. The purpose for choosing Pollard’s model of positive deconstruction was to help the researcher in: 1) Identifying the underlying worldview. 2) Analyzing the worldview. 3) Affirming the elements of truth in it (as every world view has some truth in it that needs to be recognizes and affirmed, which makes the process positive and 4) discovering the error in the worldview. These are the four elements in the process of positive deconstruction, as proposed by Pollard. Straus explores the phenomenon of corporal punishment and the traumatic effects of this method of child discipline both in term of its immediate and long term harm (later in life or in adulthood) psychological harm to children. The research methodology that was employed by the researcher in carrying out this research study is qualitative. Consequently, questionnaires were given out to 50 parents in the researcher’s church to fill. Also, one-on-one interviews were arranged with four parents, two children, and also with two pastoral caregivers in the church, on the issues of corporal punishment and child abuse within the Christian home. / Dissertation (MA Theol)--University of Pretoria, 2013. / gm2014 / Practical Theology / unrestricted

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