Scientific research has revealed that spanking does more harm than good to a child's brain, leading to aggressiveness and anti-social behavior instead of the desired behavior.
A recent research on the effects of spanking revealed that spanking children as a form of corporal punishment affects a child's brain. The research concluded that children who received spanking had less gray matter in some areas of their brain, specifically the pre-frontal cortex.
This shortage of gray matter was linked to a trend in behavior like depression and other mental health disorders. There was also a clear relationship between the amount of gray matter in the children's brains and their IQ levels.
Another research documented in the Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment, and Trauma, revealed that the gray matter in question is the mainframe of the brain's ability to learn self-control. The more gray matter a child has, the better their ability to critically evaluate situations and choose right from wrong.
A recent meta-analysis that was published in a journal titled Family Psychology, has revealed that spanking children as a form of corporal punishment leads to an increase in aggressiveness and anti-social behavior. Even worse, more mental problems could arise in the long term as children transition into adulthood.
A report given by researchers Tara Haelles and Emily Willingham scrutinized the Meta-analysis and found that the only positive outcome of spanking in the research report was that the children would immediately comply with a parent's instruction. However, over a short period of time, this immediate compliance eventually faded.
Haelles and Willingham linked spanking to more negative outcomes which included poor child-parent relationship, lower self-esteem, and reduced thinking abilities. The spanked children would also tend to determine that something was wrong because they got punished for doing it and not because of the moral essence.
What is more, children who are victims of spanking are likely to transition into violent adults and physically abuse their own children. Although spanking children is a debatable topic amongst many parents, policymakers, and practitioners in the United States, they should consider other forms of correcting their children because more evidence suggests that spanking risks harmful consequences for the children.
Watch a video on the effects of spanking kids: