Cultural Norms for Adult Corporal Punishment of Children and Societal Rates of Endorsement and Use of Violence

Abstract

SYNOPSISObjective-To test the hypothesis that societal rates of corporal punishment of children predict societal levels of violence, using "culture" as the unit of analysis.Design-Data were retrieved from the Standard Cross-Cultural Sample of anthropological records, which includes 186 cultural groups, to represent the world's 200 provinces based on diversity of language, economy, political organization, descent, and historical time. Independent coders rated the frequency and harshness of corporal punishment of children, inculcation of aggression in children, warfare, interpersonal violence among adults, and demographic, socioeconomic, and parenting covariates.Results-More frequent use of corporal punishment was related to higher rates of inculcation of aggression in children, warfare, and interpersonal violence. These relations held for inculcation of aggression in children and warfare after controlling for demographic, socioeconomic, and parenting confounds.Conclusion-More frequent use of corporal punishment is related to higher prevalence of violence and endorsement of violence at a societal level. The findings are consistent with theories that adult violence becomes more prevalent in contexts in which corporal punishment is frequent, that the use of corporal punishment increases the probability that children will engage in violent behaviors during adulthood, and that violence in one social domain tends to influence behavior in other domains. If corporal punishment leads to higher levels of societal violence, then reducing parents' use of corporal punishment should lead to reductions in societal violence manifested in other ways. INTRODUCTIONThe majority of American parents discipline their children physically. Over 90% report having used corporal punishment at least once; when asked about recent use, 40% to 70% report having used corporal punishment in a more limited time period (e.g., the last week, the last 6 months; Giles-Sims, Straus, & Sugarman, 1995;Straus, 2001;Wauchope & Straus, 1990). Corporal punishment is also widely used in other countries across the world (Durrant, 1999;Levinson, 1981;Rohner, Bourque, & Elordi, 1996;Straus, 1996;Tang, 1998).Despite its prevalence in many different societies, corporal punishment remains controversial because of several concerns. First, the question of where to draw the line between physical discipline and physical abuse is ambiguous, leading some to advocate abolition of all corporal punishment. In fact, in 12 U.S. states, "excessive corporal punishment" is explicitly included in the state's definition of maltreatment, and an additional 10 states make reference to corporal , 1997). Second, many studies find that even nonabusive physical discipline has negative effects on children's development, especially in increasing externalizing behavior problems (Gershoff, 2002). More frequent corporal punishment has been found to be related to higher levels of child aggression (Eron, Huesmann, & Zelli, 1991), delinquency (Farrington & Hawkins, 1991), and criminality (McCor...

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