Comment by taurath | Hacker News Reader

Comment by taurath | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> Parents are much less sacrosanct in the US/UK than anywhere else.

By what measure? Cultural relevance or actual legal authority?

> No one actually knows how to raise children.

We have a much better idea now about how to meet the developmental needs of children than ever before, I think almost anyone would argue. We have studies on the outcomes of things like corporal punishment. We have the ACE study and it’s effects. So many other foundational developmental science has been done in the last 30 years.

> I think it's better to let parents do their best. This leaves us with some children who were over-disciplined and some who were under-disciplined and this is a better outcome than everyone being screwed up in the same way.

I certainly won’t argue against that but I would argue that having people have at least a cursory education on child rearing might be something that would help. As a survivor of abuse it’s very difficult to allow for the idea that nothing further could be done for kids in similar positions.

> By what measure? Cultural relevance or actual legal authority?

Both. Wales made corporeal punishment illegal recently. That would be unthinkable in most of the world. In most Asian cultures, children have a lifelong obligation to their parents. In the US, once you're an adult, you're on your own and it's not uncommon to have limited contact with your parents.

> We have a much better idea now about how to meet the developmental needs of children than ever before, I think almost anyone would argue. We have studies on the outcomes of things like corporal punishment. We have the ACE study and it’s effects. So many other foundational developmental science has been done in the last 30 years.

We might know more than we used to but we know very little. I suspect the vast majority of these studies have no predictive power.

> I certainly won’t argue against that but I would argue that having people have at least a cursory education on child rearing might be something that would help. As a survivor of abuse it’s very difficult to allow for the idea that nothing further could be done for kids in similar positions.

I think your experience ("survivor of abuse") probably informs your views more than supposed advances in science of child development. And the same is true for me: the fact that my parents were/are wonderful and my father hit me occasionally explains my views here.

There is such a thing as abuse, it should be illegal, and it's a serious problem. But we're in danger of demonizing discipline and reasonable physical punishment. My experience is that discipline and love aren't opposites, they should coexist and when you don't have one, you're going to have trouble.

> Both. Wales made corporeal punishment illegal recently. That would be unthinkable in most of the world. In most Asian cultures, children have a lifelong obligation to their parents. In the US, once you're an adult, you're on your own and it's not uncommon to have limited contact with your parents.

Isn’t this the parents rather than the kids? Parents who expect their children to take care of them even in Asia may tend to treat their children better.

> We might know more than we used to but we know very little. I suspect the vast majority of these studies have no predictive power.

Look up the outcomes of the ACE study, it’s one of the most predictive statistical studies ever created when it comes to many outcomes, including premature death, substance abuse, imprisonment and even bodily health outcomes. It’s extremely important.

> And the same is true for me: the fact that my parents were/are wonderful and my father hit me occasionally explains my views here.

Studies have shown that hitting children either is neutral or harmful. That it was neutral doesn’t mean on measure it’s not tending towards harmful. The more a child is hit the more developmental problems arise. Nearly any cohort controlling for other factors, striking a child has worse outcomes. There is data to back this up.

> But we're in danger of demonizing discipline and reasonable physical punishment.

Let’s not conflate the two. A time out is not the same as teaching a child they will be hit if they don’t obey. Parental authority is not infallible.

> My experience is that discipline and love aren't opposites, they should coexist and when you don't have one, you're going to have trouble.

I agree with this point and am not arguing for no discipline. The context of this thread is being labeled a troubled teen and being forced to go to a “discipline” prison.

>Wales made corporeal punishment illegal recently. That would be unthinkable in most of the world. In most Asian cultures, children have a lifelong obligation to their parents.

China banned corporal punishment during the communist revolution of 1949, and is about to enact new laws that strengthen enforcement in rural areas and send offending parents to reeducation facilities. Japan banned it in 1947, and passed another law more explicitly banning it in 2020.

Still you are right in that compared to most of the world, the US/UK gives less authority to parents. But compared to other developed countries with similar GDP, they are still very traditional.

>the fact that my parents were/are wonderful and my father hit me occasionally explains my views here.

I'm sure many people have the same experience, but frankly I don't understand why this would lead you to conclude that hitting a child is reasonable. People cannot be divided into "good people" and "abusers"; everyone is capable of both types of behavior under the right circumstances. We can always use more research, but we have studied this topic enough that you should not be relying so much on personal anecdotal experience instead of peer reviewed research. We have large, well controlled studies that consistently show that corporal punishment contributes to developmental problems and is an ineffective method of promoting good behavior.

Answer me this: is there any type of evidence you would accept? If you were to design a study to determine whether corporal punishment is helpful or harmful, what method would you use? How big would the study have to be? How strong of a correlation would you need to see to believe it?

Do you really think these studies are "well-controlled"? If the studies showed the opposite result, would your opinion be different?

> Answer me this: is there any type of evidence you would accept? If you were to design a study to determine whether corporal punishment is helpful or harmful, what method would you use? How big would the study have to be? How strong of a correlation would you need to see to believe it?

If some mad scientist does an interventional study I would take that seriously. Can't happen, of course.

I'm not "in favor of corporeal punishment". I just don't accept the evidence that it's bad. I don't think questions like this are answerable with observational studies. Like my original post said, my view is that parents are inevitably going to experiment on their kids and that's the way it should be. There's a line somewhere, but spanking isn't over it.

> We have studies on the outcomes of things like corporal punishment

Really, though, if you understand what a study is, and the principles it must live up to to avoid inaccurate conclusions, wouldn’t you have to say that the effects of corporal punishment is almost impossible to study?

To do it right they’d need to get rick and mortys help to bounce between dimensions.

(I am sorry you suffered abuse, and I too wish more could be done to stop it).

I'm not saying anything is infallible, but the vast majority of what we know around corporal punishment is that it is ultimately harmful for everything other than obedience. It elicits aggressive behaviors in the children.

A metaanalysis that addresses some of what you're saying: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3447048/

How is this comment necessary? Many things are studied without the ability to "bounce between dimensions".

Reply on news.ycombinator.com