Corporal punishment remains a widely
endorsed parentingtool inUS families,1,2
and the United States stands out as one
of the few high-income countries that
have not followed Sweden’s lead in
banning spanking.3 This is despite the
warnings of the American Academy of
Pediatrics about the potentially deleterious
effects of spanking and recommendations
for families to use
other methods of discipline.4 The use of
spanking is highest for preschoolers
and school-age children, but even in
the first year of life recent evidence
finds 11%5 to 15%6 of children spanked
and as many as 34% of 1-year-old
children in impoverished families in
the Early Head Start National Research
and Evaluation Project.7