
Why Children Aren't Behaving and What We Can Do About It - sudouser
https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/06/02/611082566/why-children-arent-behaving-and-what-you-can-do-about-it
======
AmVess
From the article:

"Two or three decades ago, children were roaming neighborhoods in mixed-age
groups, playing pretty unsupervised or lightly supervised. They were able to
resolve disputes, which they had a strong motivation to because they wanted to
keep playing. They also planned their time and managed their games. They had a
lot of autonomy, which also feeds self-esteem and mental health."

Neighborhoods used to be packed with kids running around all the time. Now
they are empty. There are quite a few kids in my neighborhood, but the only
time you see them is when they get off the school bus. None of them roam the
neighborhood or anywhere. There is a huge park in my neighborhood, too. It's
always empty. I never see packs of kids walking on the sidewalks going to the
theater or to corner stores. School playgrounds are empty and stay empty
unless school is in session.

When I was growing up from age 6, my mom would tell me to be home by dinner,
and I'd spend all day running around with friends or adventuring by myself.
This was the norm for every kid I grew up with.

~~~
erentz
And this overprotection of children is now beginning to stretch into their
college years too: [https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/04/30/opinion/nature-
student...](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/04/30/opinion/nature-students-
risk.html)

~~~
maxxxxx
I like that article. I have had concussions, broken bones and a lot of other
injuries in my youth, probably almost died a few times. I wouldn't want to
miss any of them. I find it sad that a lot of today's parents try avoid any
kind of physical displeasure for their kinds while at the same time putting a
lot of psychological displeasure on them in the form of school and job
anxiety.

~~~
caseysoftware
I have two toddlers and I've signed (or plan to sign) them up for two things:
swim lessons & tumbling.

* I don't care/want them to be Olympic swimmers but if they fall in a pool or river, I want them to be able to tread water and get out without panicking.

* Despite everything I say and do, they're going to get on the roof. I know, I did. ;) So when they fall, I want them to fall the best way possible.

As a parent, I don't see my job to protect them from _all_ consequences but to
prevent and/or prepare them for the worst.

~~~
toomanybeersies
I'm from New Zealand, and I'm shocked at how bad some people are at swimming.
I'd understand somebody in Kansas or the middle of Australia being bad at
swimming, but New Zealand is an island nation, 75% of the population lives
within 10 km (6 miles) of the sea.

A significant proportion of people couldn't swim 250 m or tread water for 10
minutes.

~~~
bane
The first time I went to the Caribbean, I was utterly flummoxed to find out
many of the locals couldn't swim at all.

I've known people who volunteered to go to various islands to teach basic
swimming skills who also haven't been able to quite figure out why either.

[https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-
difference/2017/082...](https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-
difference/2017/0824/Most-Grenadians-don-t-know-how-to-swim.-But-one-woman-is-
changing-that)

[https://alexischateau.com/2016/11/08/10-things-you-
probably-...](https://alexischateau.com/2016/11/08/10-things-you-probably-
didnt-know-about-jamaica/)

~~~
toomanybeersies
I have a friend who worked as a diving instructor on the Gili Islands in
Indonesia for a few months. He said that a lot of the local guys who would
drive the boats couldn't swim, they also obviously didn't wear life jackets.

It just seems bizarre to me.

------
jpm_sd
As a father of three elementary school kiddos, here's my anecdotal-evidenced
perspective:

I see a lot of other children who are experiencing a simultaneous excess and
deficit of parental authority. Their parents rarely or never correct behavior
that is disrespectful, self centered, or too demanding. From my point of view,
they should be saying "No" much more often - firmly and respectfully.

At the same time, the kids are forced into endless regulated, supervised
activities and given little or no free time. Or what free time they have is
spent on YouTube. Seems to result in kids who are rude, fragile, and ignorant
of normal human interaction.

~~~
aidenn0
I am the father of 4 kids with the youngest starting kindergarten in the fall.
My anecdotal evidence is exactly the same. I'd like to add though that many
parents I've seen say "No" but then completely fail to follow through; either
giving in after repeated requests _or_ failing to provide any consequence for
disobedience[1]

If a few more HNers can chime in, we'll have enough anecdotes to call it
"data!"

1: This is not new with the current generation either. My sister and I used to
complain to our parents that they were too strict, so they talked to my
friends parents and told us "Your friends' families have almost exactly the
same rules as us!" And our response was "But they don't get into trouble when
they break the rules!"

~~~
itronitron
In my opinion, schools have a discipline problem in that schools (teachers)
tolerate/ignore disrespect from students toward their teachers and the
learning environment yet at the same time except discipline outside of school
hours, in the form of excessive homework. The net effect is that schools are a
poor environment for learning or constructive socializing, and time at home is
spent on homework which severely cuts into social activities and free-play.

~~~
aidenn0
This is definitely a problem; after observing several classrooms in a few
schools I noticed a few things:

1\. Some schools have a systematic problem of this; if the administration is
not willing to back up the teachers, the teachers have limited options.

2\. Some teachers have difficulty maintaining discipline even when the
administration is supportive.

3\. I do my best to avoid schools like #1, and with #2 usually means that
there will be approximately zero consequence to the child not doing homework.
With 4 kids I have better things to do with my time than policing homework, so
I set aside an hour a night as "study time." when my kids have figured out
they have a #2 teacher, they spend the time reading a book. The lack of
homework is not reflected in their grades, and the only consequence is I get
called a bad parent 4 times at the parent/teacher conference, which hurts my
feelings not at all.

Finally a funny little anecdote involving one of my kids and a teacher who had
_zero_ control of the classroom:

My daughter came home from school on Friday and was obviously upset. After a
bit of cajoling she said she was sad because "My teacher said that if I kept
on doing [Obnoxious Behavior] I would get detention, but I've been doing it
all week and I still haven't gotten detention. What do I have to do to get
detention?"

~~~
hycaria
This feels weird. Why don't you as a parent enforce homework (or decent
behavior) ? There's nothing to be proud of in my opinion; and maybe it's not
reflected in grades yet but learning comes through repetition, without
exception. Missing out on practice is a big deal for proficiency (and it's not
a bad habit to pick up either). Honestly I have very little sympathy for
parents that thinks its ok to disrespect teachers _because they didn 't earn
it themselves_ (or so it sounds).

~~~
aidenn0
I will help the teacher enforce homework, but I'm not going to do it alone. If
a kid doesn't want to do it, _and_ the person assigning it doesn't care if
they do it, my options are limited.

I don't think it's okay to disrespect teachers, but if the teacher's approach
to getting respect is by making threats that they never intend to follow
through on, then they are undermining themselves. There are limits on what I
can do at 3pm if the majority of my child's peers are openly disrespecting the
teacher for the previous 7 hours straight with zero consequence.

I will absolutely support the teacher in any efforts they make, but when the
teacher makes no effort, there is nothing for me to support.

~~~
hycaria
>If a kid doesn't want to do it,

How can this even be an argument.

>and the person assigning it doesn't care if they do it

They do obviously since you have negative feedback from the teachers about
undone homework. Also as a parent shouldn't you care if they do it ?

>I don't think it's okay to disrespect teachers

Then why can she be obnoxious in class, complain about it at home and still
nothing happens ?

Do you meet regularily with the teachers ? Or communicate with them about how
you wished they would enforce punitions ? Or at the very least tell them how
you learned about how your child is doing X (why do you even learn it from
her, isn't there supposed to be feedback every trimester or such ?) which
sucks, is unappropriate and which you've discussed with her, etc...

~~~
aidenn0
>> If a kid doesn't want to do it,

> How can this even be an argument.

I mentioned it because if my child wants to do their homework then all
problems go away. The ultimate goal _is_ that my child will want to do their
homework; I'm obviously not going to monitor their homework once they are in
college.

>> and the person assigning it doesn't care if they do it

> They do obviously since you have negative feedback from the teachers about
> undone homework.

Let me tell you an analogous story from my work: Another engineer tells me
they have an urgent problem they need solved. Every time they ask me about it
they stress how urgent it is. However, when I ask for clarification or more
information, it takes them several work days, and sometimes several reminders
for them to get back to me. I ran into them a few weeks after the issue was
resolved and asked them how it went. They respond that they haven't done any
testing of it yet.

Was the problem really urgent for them? After all, they did tell me many times
how urgent it was.

> Also as a parent shouldn't you care if they do it?

I want my child to be successful. Doing homework is a very important part of
that. However, as I said earlier the goal is that when they are older they
will choose to do that. I do not believe that standing behind my child for 3
hours a night 5 days a week making sure they stay on-task is an effective way
of achieving that goal (not to mention that with 4 children it would take up 6
hours each of my time and my wife's time).

My parents were incredibly strict about homework. The day I left the house I
stopped doing homework and I nearly flunked out of college. My wife's parents
were far less strict about homework and she graduated college in 3 years.

It seems to be working with my kids too. My oldest is a 5th grader and
recently had a research paper due. She gathered her materials and then
procrastinated. She was obviously embarrassed when she asked to stay up late
to work on it, which to me is a sign that she understands it's her
responsibility to get it done.

>> I don't think it's okay to disrespect teachers

> Then why can she be obnoxious in class, complain about it at home and still
> nothing happens?

I never said nothing happens. In this specific case I had her collate
worksheets for the teacher before school one morning. I find it absurd that I
had to be the one to correct a behavior that had been going on in the
classroom for 5 days.

> Do you meet regularily with the teachers?

In general 4 times a year (there's a quarter system here). For this specific
case, I volunteered in the classroom for an hour a week, so I saw the teacher
a lot (it's also how I know that she had zero control over the classroom). The
teacher never informed me of my daughter's behavior, nor the threat of
detention.

> Or communicate with them about how you wished they would enforce punitions?

Yes. Some listen, others ignore me (My wife has been told she's wrong, perhaps
a bit of casual sexism there, but I never been contradicted, just ignored by
the teachers that tell my wife she's wrong).

> Or at the very least tell them how you learned about how your child is doing
> X (why do you even learn it from her, isn't there supposed to be feedback
> every trimester or such ?) which sucks, is unappropriate and which you've
> discussed with her, etc...

Yes, I've done all these things (and it's quarters rather than trimesters
where I live).

------
ravenscrow
That's strange considering we've been told that kids today are the best
behaved.

"Today's teenagers are the best-behaved generation on record"

[https://www.vox.com/2014/5/25/5748178/todays-teenagers-
are-t...](https://www.vox.com/2014/5/25/5748178/todays-teenagers-are-the-best-
behaved-generation-on-record)

"Today's Teens Better Behaved Than Their Parents"

[https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/02/the-kids-are-
more-...](https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/02/the-kids-are-more-than-
all-right/)

"Wonkblog Today’s teens are way better behaved than you were"

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/12/13/today...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/12/13/todays-
teens-are-way-better-behaved-than-you-were)

But it's summer ( notoriously slow news season ) and what better to sell than
fear to parents. The other parental fear piece within the last 24 hours.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17214841](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17214841)

~~~
strictnein
The definition of "behaved" in use in those articles has to do with drug use
and unprotected sex.

You don't do drugs and have unprotected sex if you stay home all day. The lack
of opportunity to misbehave doesn't make you more "behaved".

------
dsnuh
I'm a parent of two, and step-parent to two, between the ages 5 -11. I think a
lot about this, and one of the biggest issues I see (besides the many valid
points I feel the article raised) is that with the rise of Internet video, we
are showing kids to kids more often, if that makes sense.

I grew up in the 80's, and cartoons were most of the media I consumed. You
usually saw anthropomorphical characters depicting behaviors. When you did see
live action, it was usually centered more around adults teaching or mentoring
the kids (or Muppets), and when kids did appear, they were polite unless being
used to illustrate bad behavior.

Today, with so much self-published content, kids are seeing other kids, often
acting in outrageous ways to get views, likes, followers, and fans. When media
became decentralized, I think we lost a powerful cultural platform for shared
experience and norms, and it is starting to show.

~~~
jasonmaydie
I will disagree with the TV thing, but I think isolation and very strict
control over their schedule isn't helping. For example my 3.5 year old wanted
to play in our backyard, I said no because we have no fence and he could
wander away plus I found some garden snakes last week and didn't want him
alone down there. However part of me felt bad for him because he wanted to be
outside in the grass and I was too worried to let him do it.

~~~
dsnuh
Do you not trust your child to not wander away if you said something like,
"Yes, go play, but be careful, and remember not to go past the tree (or
whatever)"?

Do you let your son ride in cars? That seems way more dangerous than letting
him play in his backyard.

I don't know you, and there's all kinds of ways to parent, but it feels like
you may have some unhealthy anxiety surrounding your child's safety if this is
your standard reaction.

------
Someone1234
> certified parent educator

There doesn't seem to be any legitimacy to that claim. Meaning there are
places that claim they can certify you, but they themselves have no real
legitimacy (e.g. no specific educational track, just a broad philosophy you
agree to adhere to).

The article is worth reading, but it is more accurate to describe the author
as a journalist with three kids, they have no specific qualifications.

~~~
weeksie
Bingo! This is hocus pocus lifestyle bullshit. I live with a psychologist and
child behavior is something that has been studied extensively. There are well
researched techniques to help a child behave and nothing in that article made
me believe the author had a clue about them.

------
abalone
_> far more children today struggle to manage their behavior [than in the past
few decades]._

What evidence does the book cite to support this premise?

Also, a plea: let's please answer this question before everybody posts their
personal hot takes on children and parenting.

~~~
acct1771
Amount of psychiatric drugs stuffed down their mouths as a hotfix.

~~~
acct1771
Oh, you said the book - apologies.

------
AndrewKemendo
As a father of three here is what keeps me from just sending my kids out to
play:

Other parents.

Other parents see your kids alone and freak the fuck out. Some will call the
police, and then threaten you that they will call CPS/DPS if they need to and
report neglect.

In fact I was out with the kids on their bikes the other day and they were a
bit ahead of me when they stopped safely at a crosswalk to wait for me. A
woman pulled up and started chastising them for being unsafe because they
weren't with a parent, when I walked up. She said "You're lucky I came along
because some other people around here would run them over or call the police."

So yea, I'm not sure what's wrong with these other parents, but I'd love to
send my kids to play outside all day without me worrying that I'm gonna get a
cop on my doorstep.

~~~
jeffnappi
Utah has recently passed explicit amendments to their child neglect statutes
to clarify that otherwise well cared for children allowed to play unsupervised
is _not_ child neglect.

Other states should follow suit.

[https://le.utah.gov/~2018/bills/static/SB0065.html](https://le.utah.gov/~2018/bills/static/SB0065.html)
[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/29/well/family/utah-
passes-f...](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/29/well/family/utah-passes-free-
range-parenting-law.html)

~~~
AndrewKemendo
I saw this and thought it was great, but simultaneously thought all hope is
lost if Utah is setting the standard for being reasonable.

------
sjclemmy
I think it’s Adults who are supposed to manage their own behaviour. Children?
Not so much. This sounds like a rehash of the ‘Kids today’ perspective.
Children have always been children and Adults have always struggled with their
behaviour.

Adults have always romanticised their own childhood ‘it wasn’t like that in my
day, I’d have never gotten away with that’ etc.

I just don’t buy it.

~~~
cwp
Are you a parent?

~~~
sjclemmy
Yes. And they’ve both turned out fine so far.

------
anigbrowl
This is a terrible article that just uncritically assumes the worst of the
'kids today!' stereotype (which has been around since Plato's time) as a
starting premise. I know it's Sunday but I'm surprised to see such fluff high
up on HN.

~~~
Pulcinella
“The children now love luxury; they have bad manners, contempt for authority;
they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise.
Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households. They no longer
rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before
company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannize
their teachers."

-Plato/Socrates (though _incredibly_ likely this is apocryphal)

~~~
tarr11
Apparently this was not Plato or Socrates. However, the author wrote it in
1909 so the point still stands!

[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-
childre...](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-children-in-
ancient-times/)

------
frabbit
It's all down to cars. In two ways, one of them less facetious than the other:

1) Automobiles have a vast amount of land space dedicated to them. And the
land that is not physically occupied by parking lots and roads is subdivided,
separated and made inaccessible[1]. And this trend is continuing[2]. It's why
other large mammals (bears, moose, wolves) face significant problems in
reproduction. Add to this the noise and the light pollution and even if you
did not fear that your neighbor, reaching back to pass an organic fruit-
leather to the fruit of his loins, would mow down your child, the available
outdoors is just not what it was.

2) Paedophiles and rapists are greatly facilitated by the availability of
fast, relatively anonymous, convenient transport. The same characteristics
that make said automobiles attractive to terrorists (when they're not actually
directly driving them into people as a weapon that no one acknowledges).

1\.
[http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2016/12/19/roads-i...](http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/d-brief/2016/12/19/roads-
impact-on-ecosystems/) 2\.
[http://science.sciencemag.org/content/358/6362/442](http://science.sciencemag.org/content/358/6362/442)

~~~
elktea
I agree the automobile is at the heart of it. Everything from land use and
distance, as you mentioned, to the danger of roads for kids. Children these
days are driven _everywhere_ , even to the local park or for soccer on the
weekends.

------
awat
The part about being “unemployed” to me immediately made me think about the
prevalence of future tense pressures for modern kids. I’m in my mid 20s and I
went through it.

While my parents had good intentions and many others I’m sure did too. You
start building this monster of future pressures about colleges, social media
emphasizing what you should like, and lots of other pressures you can’t
actually resolve in Elementary or Jr. High but you are made aware of them and
focused on them by your surroundings.

------
jancsika
The reason children aren't behaving (at least in the U.S.) is because a large
number of parents never _practice_ parenting and never seek out advice from
reliable resources.

For example-- I've heard numerous vacuous rationalizations from parents young
and old for spanking their children. What's the research say on spanking? The
vast majority over decades says that it doesn't improve behavior and in fact
increases the likelihood of aggression in children.

So why would parents continue doing it? It's the same reason an ineffectual
guitarist keeps starting over on Stairway to Heaven. Because, "Gosh, I had it
perfect _once_ out of 200 failures in my bedroom by myself last week."

So it is with parents: "Gosh, I don't get why they're acting out, they were
_so good_ that _one_ time out of 200 outbursts while I was paying a moderate
amount of attention to them last week."

Edit: clarification

~~~
alien_at_work
>never seek out advice from reliable resources.

What reliable resources would those be? Poorly defined, crap studies done by
people who've never had children and the study was never independantly
reproduced by anyone?

In the beginning, pain is the only means of communication (although we didn't
actually spank, a little tug on the side burns did the trick). In my
experience, once a child is old enough to understand time-based punishment
(e.g. you don't get to watch TV _tomorrow_ ) a little and what it will mean,
that becomes more effective.

------
thx11389793
Having seen a whole tide of articles like this recently, I wonder how long it
will be before popular opinion and parenting practices trend back toward
giving children appropriate amounts of autonomy.

I hesitate at the thought of raising children here (or at all) for a variety-
pack of reasons, one of which is that I was rather over-protected as a child,
and I'd rather not pass the results of that that on to my kids.

Any current American-kid-havers care to comment on how difficult it actually
is to raise non-sheltered kids in the modern age? Is it a big problem or
perhaps overblown for the NPR crowd?

~~~
RobertRoberts
I am wary of joining this conversation in general. But I have kids, and I have
lived both in big cities where stuff was stolen from our porch on a regular
basis (we needed a neighborhood watch) and in small towns where we never had
to lock our doors.

I've lived in incredibly liberal and conservative areas as well. Some places
were very religious with a church for every few hundred in the populace, and
where you couldn't even find a church.

Across the board, the liberal, non-religious, high-populace areas had the
worst behaved children in public. But religious groups control public
perceptions better (my opinion) so privately they could be just as bad or
worse off, but that doesn't seem to be the point of this article.

But what I found as a parent, was that children mimic their parents. Period.

Even if you have vacant parents, the kids will still have enough time around
them to copy their beliefs and act on them.

I taught in college for 12 years, and the kids that came into my class room
changed dramatically from early 2000s till I was done. Something changed in
society the past 20 years in a way I can't understand.

One thing is for certain though, you can take a nice decent kid, and give them
everything they want, and they can turn into brats when you try and take
anything back.

I learned this the hard way with cellphones. My first kid turned super nasty
as soon as she got a phone. Partly because all her friends ignored her, she
was the only one without a phone in the group settings, so she sat by herself
with no one to play with. So we got her an ipod touch, and we instantly had
behavior problems.

In retrospect, she was copying my problems as a person, so it's not her fault.
But any discussion where the blame isn't placed squarely on the parents first
and foremost, is in my opinion, either deceitful with a motive or simply
ignorant and possibly a parent in denial.

A parent can raise decent children in almost any environment as long as they
are willing to stand up against the negative influences around them.

~~~
BerislavLopac
> Something changed in society the past 20 years in a way I can't understand.

> My first kid turned super nasty as soon as she got a phone.

I think you might be on to something here...

~~~
BerislavLopac
And Scott Adams agrees:
[http://dilbert.com/strip/2018-06-07](http://dilbert.com/strip/2018-06-07)

------
avip
I'm not sure what are the root causes of the kids' behavioural crisis (I'm not
even sure there is one), but let me tell you with 100% confidence what will
not solve them: Yet another parenting book.

------
crankylinuxuser
We've been reading and seeing this shit since Socrates.

“The children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority;
they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise.”

Lets frame this a different way.

1\. Crime has gone down in all measurements. (Theories state its likely lack
of lead pollution.) 2\. More people renting, and less engagement in the
community. 3\. People whining about kids these days 4\. Older adults realizing
they dont younger generation doing what they did 5\. Kids now have more
inhouse distraction (computers, games, etc) that their friends are on 6\.
Parent(s) working long hours and cant take kids to friends houses 7\. Scare
articles like this one whipping parents into a frightful frenzy

~~~
petagonoral
> We've been reading and seeing this shit since Socrates.

No, we haven't. That beautiful self serving quote is from a students
dissertation from 1907 -
[https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-
childre...](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/05/01/misbehaving-children-in-
ancient-times/)

Novel quotes which have a ring of truth don't get to invalidate peoples'
opinions.

------
adanto6840
20 years ago, my father attributed the general "change in children" to the
widespread availability & use of household air-conditioning.

Granted this won't be true throughout all climates, but I recall thinking it
had a lot of merit at the time and I continue to think so today. My father
would tell me that, when he was a kid, they'd either sit at home in a 90F+
house on Long Island with the windows open -- miserable, as I can attest from
living it when we'd visit as a kid -- or they'd go outside and play "stick
ball" in the same weather with their friends. For them, it was an easy choice.

Today, children either play on their devices at home (often interacting with
'friends' online) or they go to the home of their friend and, likewise, they
often play indoors.

I truly believe that the climate-controlled dwellings of today are a large
part of the reason; I know that personally I'd generally far prefer to be
indoors in my climate-controlled 72F dwelling versus outdoors riding a bike or
similar and I'd imagine the same, unfortunately but not surprisingly, holds
true for children as well.

As a fairly new parent with another on the way, I'm not sure to what extent
we'll try to combat this; as a child myself "screen time" was often a point of
contention though in my case it was also the early start of my career.

------
major505
Spanking. No kiddin. You don't need to put your children in a hospital. But a
little slap in the buns never killed nobody, and as a last resort toll. can be
really effective. Of course, go for ligth mesures before, and then scalate.

Take the things the kid like first, for a while, like no videogames fo a week,
or two. If the nocive behavour dosen't go away, increase the time.

~~~
stephen_g
There's probably something to this. I don't have kids so luckily I don't have
to think much about it (yet, at least). While there are plenty of studies
about psychological issues from spanking, but I've always been uncomfortable
about the definitions. There is a fair difference between a single sharp smack
on the butt (clothed, not bare) like I and my siblings, friends etc. used to
get (and deserve) as kids, and actual abuse (i.e. beatings, using implements,
hits to the face, arms, torso, etc.), but I feel like most of the studies lump
them in together.

It's also hard to control for whether it's a single spank for discipline used
only when the situation warrants it or routine, arbitrary or random spanking.
There's probably going to be psychological abuse or neglect coming along with
it if it's the latter but far less likely for the former.

~~~
NLips
I have children (too young for this to matter yet) and I have the same
discomfort. I was 'smacked' on the bottom sometimes as a child - no real idea
about the frequency as this would now be a long time ago. Small children don't
have the same sense of reasoning / looking forward as e.g. teenagers or
adults, so I appreciate something more primeval should work better (and I'm
not going to take away their food). But while all the data suggests hitting or
spanking a child is bad, there seems to be no mentions of discriminating
between genuinely physically harming the child (e.g. lasting damage like a
bruise) and something which hurts but has zero long or medium-term physical
effect - just a temporary stinging of the skin over a heavily muscled or fatty
area like the bottom.

My personal feeling is that if researched well, the data would probably show
that in small children, some form of physical punishment would be shown to be
effective and leave no lasting psycological issues. I just don't think there's
any good evidence either way.

~~~
weeksie
I promise there not only has been research on small children and corporal
punishment and that it's not at all effective and that it is damaging. Above I
linked to an article on the subject by the APA. Here's a link to the meta-
analysis referenced in the article:
[https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10567-005-2340-z](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10567-005-2340-z)

~~~
NLips
From the abstract at that link:

"The results indicated that effect sizes significantly favored conditional
spanking over 10 of 13 alternative disciplinary tactics for reducing child
noncompliance or antisocial behavior. Customary physical punishment yielded
effect sizes equal to alternative tactics, except for one large study favoring
physical punishment. Only overly severe or predominant use of physical
punishment compared unfavorably with alternative disciplinary tactics."

In short:

conditional spanking - more effective that 10/13 other disciplining methods

customary spanking - no more or less effective than other disciplining methods

severe / predominant use of spanking - worse than other methods

The rest of the material available without access to the full paper just seems
to back the assertion that data is poor on this topic, and there are
methodological issues that make it hard to assess different levels of physical
punishment seperately.

~~~
weeksie
My bad. I usually try not to do _exactly the thing I did_, rage-pasting a link
without reading it fully.

I'm not going to get into a deep back and forth over this, but nothing I am
aware of shows spanking of any sort has good long term effects on behavior and
pretty much every piece of literature out there points to corporal punishment
being effective for getting a kid to cease acting out, but either ineffective
or worse for long term behavior changes.

And sure, maybe being super calm and measured with your application of
corporal punishment will prevent it from doing damage. Just seems like a
strange path to take when there are effective ones out there that don't
require violence or the threat of violence against children.

~~~
major505
My mom and dad use to hit me in the bottons witha flip flop as a last resort.

Usually the first measure would she put me staring the wall for a few minutes.
To a children that was horrible since I was really bored with the punishment.

In more than one occasion she forget that I was in the "thinking corner" and
found me sleeping on my feed, suported by my face in the wall.

------
newnewpdro
From what I've seen, parents aren't parenting like they used to. Mom and dad,
if they're even in the same household, often both work full-time jobs.

These fundamental changes in the average family have consequences.

~~~
DoreenMichele
I was a full-time mom for a lot of years. I say such things to my adult sons.
Trying to say it on HN tends to go bad places. It isn't politically correct to
observe that the lack of time to parent could negatively impact parenting. No
matter how neutrally I say it or how carefully I word it, I am inevitably
accused of sexism, as if my position is "Women should all be barefoot and
pregnant."

Oy.

------
outsidetheparty
> asks why so many kids today are having trouble managing their behavior and
> emotions.

...For starters, is there evidence that this is actually a thing?

Once it gets down to the details it sounds like Generic Parenting Advice From
Any Point In The Last 50 Years: don't use bribes, make consequences clear,
give kids some control but not too much, when you're overwhelmed walk away...
but the initial premise is a pretty big one to just throw out there
unsupported.

------
lurquer
Most children are raised with single parents.

That implies daycare and possession schedules.

Both have the potential to drastically screw up a kid. (Imagine being bounced
back and forth between two homes throughout the month. It would drive you
mad.)

Strange that he article doesn't mention it. The utter lack of stable and
consistent housing for children (due to possession schedules) is perhaps the
biggest societal 'experiment' ever run.

~~~
fibbery
"The Majority of Children Live With Two Parents, Census Bureau Reports"

[https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-
releases/2016/cb16-192...](https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-
releases/2016/cb16-192.html)

~~~
lurquer
I'd be interested in seeing how 'parent' is defined. Does it include step-
parent?

------
Cd00d
Why the text only version link? I prefer the formatted:
[https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/06/02/611082566/why-
chi...](https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/06/02/611082566/why-children-
arent-behaving-and-what-you-can-do-about-it)

~~~
ekingr
Not to have to accept the tracking cookies policy, I guess.

------
rubicon33
I think this has a lot to do with the housing crisis.

Hear me out...

When I was a kid I was lucky enough to be raised in a new development
community packed with YOUNG families. Imagine this. These were 1st, or maybe
2nd home buyers (age 23-32) who were STARTING their families there. It was a
time when young people could afford a nice home in a safe neighborhood, AND
support kids.

The result was amazing. Kids. Lots of kids. Kids roamed the streets. The sense
of community was abundant. Halloween and Christmas were a BLAST as all the
families went to great lengths to dress up their home.

Nowadays? I live in a different neighborhood. People are RENTING. There's no
safe, nice, affordable neighborhood for new families to settle. Sense of
community as a result is diminished. People don't feel planted and invested in
the home so they're less likely to be invested in the community. I don't see
any kids these days. Halloween, could be any other day.

~~~
tux1968
As a counterpoint, I grew up in a relatively poor neighborhood, in a rented
home. Was part of a huge community of kids who all played together
unsupervised, especially all summer long. In the school yard, downtown, down
by the river, in the park, we ranged pretty far as we got older. Once you had
a bike there were unsupervised day trips to wooded areas where we played a
poor-man's predecessor to paintball using slingshots and pilfered grapes.

From my limited experience, home ownership is not a requirement for free-range
children.

~~~
astura
Yeah, no kidding!! Literally every single person I know rented growing up and
the streets were filled with kids. In fact, since apartments are smaller, it's
more incentive to get outside.

------
Fukkaudeku
Because the generation that gets all high and mighty about their childhood
being more fun and outside (i.e. Gen Xers) are now the ones that are raising
the next generation of children to be safe and are also complaining about it.

------
basejumping
140 comments and almost none about why children aren't behaving and what to do
about it. Just like the article

------
known
Parents should teach kids to appreciate diversity and accommodate adversity

------
ouid
You know who are terrible models for learning human behavior? Children. Why do
we expect our children to learn good models of human behavior by interacting
with other children?

