Discipline As Seen in Children. Paper Example

"My parents never hit me." Chances are that if you hear someone say this, then there are two ways you would react. One, you would be compelled to understand where that person is coming from. This is because you may have been brought up in a similar manner. The other option would be that you are unable to comprehend a life where your parents would not impose physical disciplinary measures on you. Crazy as it sounds, truth is, if you reacted negatively, then it would be because you were raised in a different culture. Either, your parent's had a different perception of what is to be considered good and bad or your home life culture was just different compared to a person who was never hit as a kid. Irrespective of your reaction, it goes without saying that, it is only a personal opinion towards the way which parents choose to discipline their children. This may be down to the fact that you would only relate to one way of bringing up children. The exact one with which you were brought up with.

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Across the globe, different cultures treat their children with respect to what is required of their own culture's morals. This is to say that, they thus will do to their children, as they were done by their parents. That being the only way that is known to their culture. But, as children who do not get to choose the circumstances and the context of the generation from which you were born and to who you'll be raised by, it is not fair to assume that, disciplinary measures that worked in an older generation will automatically work on children from a different generation. Are the children who are scolded through physical actions bound to be better off than a child whose only punishment is to think about what they've done? Where's the line between discipline and abuse? These are questions that have lingered but really no defined answer can ever be said. But if we distinguish the good and the bad of every home and every culture's parenting methods and their effects on children, then I think we can create our own answer.

On the culture, one would be quick to speculate assumptions such as whites apply lesser physical punishment measures than folks of black ethnicity. It is argued that whites are less strict when it relates to parenting and as such their children are easily corrected by mere word of mouth. However, for families where parents are known to be very strict, physical disciplinary measures are inevitable. Still, this is not to say, that the less strict families wouldn't be associated with hitting their children whenever they do wrong.

One would be keen to wonder; why am I invested in this topic? Why do I care? How does it matter to me? How would it matter to others? To answer the question above, I will explain the need to discipline our children. First, anyone will agree with me that disciplining a child will aid him/her in better decision making. They thus will adopt healthier options when they chose what to do or not. Also, by disciplining kids, they learn how to manage their emotions. This way, your child will be able to timely pace himself out of trouble rather than engage in it. All in all, the key reasons for disciplining children are to ensure that they respect their elders, conduct themselves appropriately, to better the social skills in whole and to shun from dirty and unbeneficial conduct. (Murray p, 134).

Knowing the importance that discipline plays in the day-to-day life of your child, one would not want to get it all wrong. Certain families are known to administer disciplinary measures in ways that are not quite effective. The most common mistakes made when correcting children are as follows; first, failure to clearly define boundaries on what is wrong and what is right. This way, children will do as they please and thus get into trouble. The second mistake done is where guardians fail to go into detail when establishing the cause for wrongdoing. This may result in parents punishing children for no wrongdoing hence their retaliation. Third, mistake most parents to make comes when they fail to outline consequences due to doing wrong. This way, children will go way out of what they are supposed to, simply because they do not mind. Last of the mistakes made by guardians when punishing their children is denying them the right to explain themselves whenever they do wrong (Graham p, 41). This will only encourage one-sided arguments that will solve very little or nothing at all. The punished child will not see the essence of the disciplinary measure hence he/she will become rebellious. As outlined, parents who make mistakes when disciplining their children may make them adopt characters that are not well advocated for in society. Essentially that would be wrong. (Citation, n.p)

Proceeding along these lines, we beg to ask ourselves the question, 'how should one identify with the most appropriate manner, to impose disciplinary will on children?' Also, one would ask himself the following question; ' what signs to help identify a child that needs to be disciplined?

To begin with, being a guardian is never an easy task. It requires that you bring up a child in manners which, they should be able to differentiate on what should be done and what they shouldn't. To achieve this, one would have to invest a lot of time and understanding. As established by the American Academy of Paediatrics, effective disciplinary measures will have to entail the following.

First, the disciplinary strategy being imposed should be well able to clearly aid a child to tell on what is bad and good. This is set to be attained by maintaining a calm nature with the child when teaching her the modest character traits you would otherwise want them to depict. Failure to reduce yourself to the child's bracket would result in them becoming repulsive of what you tell them to do. (HealthyChildren.org, n.p)

Second, the strategies should be sure to set limits for anything. Rules of conduct ought to be well laid out to the children in a clear way that they should understand, hence be able to comprehend. Take your time to define the rules clearly to the young ones. This will go a long way in eradicating cases of ignorance. (Kidshealth, n.p)

Third, as a guardian, you should lay out rules that result in consequence due to failure to abide by the rules in place. Take time to explain to the child that you would discipline her accordingly if, she fails to uphold what is expected of her. In so doing, you should be keen enough to not let the soft you have for them come in the way of discipline. Otherwise, the disciplinary strategy being put to use needs to be all accommodating and lenient. This is to say that the strategy should allow for one to hear out the child's argument, with respect to the offense they may have committed. This will also call for the need for you to be attentive about what they do and say. It is only through this that one may identify traits that should be done away with. (HealthyChildren.org, n.p)

Another strategy to be employed when imposing disciplinary will requires that guardians give credit to what has been well accomplished when it has been accomplished. Complementing a child when he or she does good will certainly prompt them to trade along those lines. (Kidshealth.org , n.p)

Lastly, each and every guardian ought to anticipate for disciplinary cases from their children. This will help them be ready for them whenever they do occur. Also, the guardians may know when to not respond with vigor to avoid weird confrontations with the children that may otherwise be damaging. (HealthyChildren.org, n.p)

It was key that I outlined the essence of effective parenting. This would go a long way in explaining how various households and their cultures, choose to discipline children. Also, one can establish reasons for failure by some families when administering disciplinary measures. First, realize that for families who administer corporal punishment, they do so use physical attacks such as slaps, or by the use of tools such as a whip. In so doing, the bank their argument on the need to inflict physical pain so as to bring a lesson home.

Various studies were done on families that punish their children and the findings are as outlined below. To begin with, as explained by Straus and Steward only 17% of guardians are known to physically beat their children. Elsewhere, Holden, William, and Holland helped show that 85% of the infants in the United States will be hit somewhere along their lifeline. This is to say that not all parents have resorted to physical assault but, some just find it effective (Murray p, 133). Studies would also help show that traits associated with physical assault as a means of administering discipline would vary as based on various individual characteristics. This would range from the educational heights attained by an individual, the ethnicity and race of a person, the religious beliefs upheld by various people, the age of the guardian and their gender.

All this would help influence the view on hitting children to correct them.However, for families that beat their children, certain child characteristics would be associated with triggering physical disciplinary measures. E.g. the age, sex and children's temperaments. How is this so? For the case of sex, the boy child was found to be more prone to physical beating as compared to the girl child, who was handled with more ease. When it comes to age, kids aged around three to four years would quite easily be victims of assault in bids of administering discipline. This is down to their playful nature which pays little consideration to what they have been instructed to do. Finally, for the case of temperament, the tough headed children will be easy victims of physical disciplinary traits as compared to the more understanding ones. (Psychology Benefits Society, n.p.).

Furthermore, deeper factors may result in families opting to administer physical punishment. For instance, trends may show that children of a certain generation may have otherwise adopted a mindset thought to be too liberal. This way, it becomes difficult to apply correctional measures to them by ways of verbal intervention. Hence, a guardian will thus resort to physical punishment. Elsewhere, guardians may experience external pressure from the stress that may otherwise compel them to administer physical punishment. Tough socio-economic times that are characteristic of a recession can cause pressure for adults catering for younger ones hence causing them to transmit it down through physical punishment. Weird beliefs in the society which advocate for physical punishments are also to blame. (Psychology Benefits Society, n.p).

In conclusion, disciplinary measures vary across different cultures and individual traits. For the homes where the parents are strict and inconsiderate, their children turn out to be rude and unruly. This can be partially attributed to the wrong execution of the disciplinary measures as discussed. Elsewhere, for families where the parents are known to create a good rapport with their children, the kids will be keen to listen when they are being corrected and hence follow suit. As such, it is important that parents and guardians be well versed with information on how disciplinary measures should be administered.

Work Cited

Reid, Graham J., et al. "Randomized trial of distance-based treatment for young children with discipline problems seen in primary health care." Family practice 30.1 (2012): 14-24.

Straus, Murray A. "Discipline and deviance: Physical punishment of children and violence and other crime in adulthood." Social problems 38.2 (1991): 133-154.

HealthyChildren.org. (2019). What's the Best Way to Discipline My Child? [Online]