Abstract
Objective
To determine the association between use of physical discipline and parental report
of physically aggressive child behaviors in a cohort of young children who were without
indicators of current or past physical abuse.
Methods
The data for this study were analyzed from an initial cohort of patients enrolled
in a prospective, observational, multicenter pediatric emergency department-based
study investigating bruising and familial psychosocial characteristics of children
younger than 4 years of age. Over a 7-month period, structured parental interviews
were conducted regarding disciplinary practices, reported child behaviors, and familial
psychosocial risk factors. Children with suspected physical abuse were excluded from
this study. Trained study staff collected data using standardized questions. Consistent
with grounded theory, qualitative coding by 2 independent individuals was performed
using domains rooted in the data. Inter-rater reliability of the coding process was
evaluated using the kappa statistic. Descriptive statistics were calculated and multiple
logistic regression modeling was performed.
Results
Three hundred seventy-two parental interviews were conducted. Parents who reported
using physical discipline were 2.8 (95% confidence interval [CI], 1.7–4.5) times more
likely to report aggressive child behaviors of hitting/kicking and throwing. Physical
discipline was used on 38% of children overall, and was 2.4 (95% CI, 1.4–4.1) times
more likely to be used in families with any of the psychosocial risk factors examined.
Conclusions
Our findings indicated that the use of physical discipline was associated with higher
rates of reported physically aggressive behaviors in early childhood as well as with
the presence of familial psychosocial risk factors.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: February 25, 2016
Accepted:
February 20,
2016
Received:
August 13,
2015
Footnotes
The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Identification
Copyright
Copyright © 2016 by Academic Pediatric Association
