Parental Beliefs and Actual Use of Corporal Punishment, School Violence and Bullying, and Depression in Early Adolescence.

Ji-Kang Chen,Zixin Pan,Li-Chih Wang

doi:10.3390/ijerph18126270

Abstract

Prior studies on adverse outcomes of parental corporal punishment on children have focused on examining one of two broad domains of parental corporal punishment: parental beliefs or actual use. Recently, researchers have argued that parental belief and actual use of corporal punishment should work jointly to contribute to children’s depression and involvement in school violence. Yet, studies supporting this proposition are lacking. This study examined the indirect link from parental attitudes towards corporal punishment to children’s depression and school violence involvement through actual use of corporal punishment. Four hundred and thirty-three elementary school students and their parents in Taiwan participated in this study. The results indicate that positive parental attitudes towards corporal punishment do not predict children’s depression and involvement in school violence. However, parental attitudes towards corporal punishment had significant indirect relationships with depression and involvement in school violence through the actual use of corporal punishment. These findings applied to both genders. This study supports the proposition that parental attitudes and the actual use of corporal punishment could work together to predict children’s depression and school violence. Future intervention programs for decreasing children’s depressive symptoms and involvement in school violence might need to tackle corporal punishment in the family.

Highlights

School violence and bullying as well as depression are of significant concern to the public worldwide, among school-aged children [1,2,3,4]
Using multiple pieces of information from parents and children, the current study aims to examine joint contributions of parental beliefs and actual use of corporal punishment to children’s depression and involvement in school violence and proposes a theoretical model to examine the indirect pathways from parental attitudes towards corporal punishment to children’s depression and involvement in school violence through actual parental use of corporal punishment
In contrast to previous studies on negative outcomes of corporal punishment typically focusing on examining how either parental beliefs or actual use of corporal punishment affect children’s internal and external problems, this study provides evidence to support a joint effect of parental attitudes and actual use of corporal punishment on children’s psychological and behavioral outcomes

Summary

Introduction

School violence and bullying as well as depression are of significant concern to the public worldwide, among school-aged children [1,2,3,4]. School bullying and violence are widespread in Taiwan [8,9,10,11,12], and student victimization by peers, student perpetration against peers, student and maltreatment by teachers are three major forms negatively influencing Taiwanese school-aged students’ well-being [10,11,13,14,15]. A common parenting practice to discipline children in many countries, in East Asian cultures, such as Taiwan, has been theorized as a potential factor contributing to children’s negative psychological and behavioral outcomes [12,19,20,21,22]

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion