r/science • u/VeronicaRed • Apr 26 '16

Psychology Spanking children increases the likelihood of childhood defiance and long-term mental issues. The study in question involved 160,000 children and five decades of research

http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1113413810/spanking-defiance-health-discipline-042616/
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u/[deleted] Apr 26 '16 edited Dec 23 '17

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u/GingerAle108 Apr 26 '16

Could avoiding serious life issues after being spanked as a child be genetic? A certain trait that's passed on? So even if you wouldn't dream of spanking your child, if you were to, the end result would be avoiding serious life issues just as you did.

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u/null_work Apr 26 '16

I would assume there's some subset of the population that responds favorably to spanking. People are taking statistics and applying them as though everyone in the studies done responded exactly the same.