Time-out? Gentle parenting? What an expert says about child discipline

For a lot of us parents, it feels like we’re just trying to figure this parenting thing out. What should we do if a child acts out and hits another child or misbehaves in other ways?

There are countless suggestions on social media about how to best handle these situations.

As part of a week-long series on parenting, LAist’s AirTalk covered how parents treat each of their children differently (or not), where we get our parenting instincts, and other topics.

And the series was also about discipline. Although it used to be much more widespread, spanking is still relatively common in American households.

Here is the AirTalk conversation with Cara Goodwin, a licensed clinical psychologist and the founder of ParentingTranslator.com.

Spanking is ineffective and harmful

Although still common, the evidence shows that spanking is not only ineffective at changing a child’s behavior, but is also harmful.

“It’s associated with many negative outcomes in children,” Goodwin said, such as relationship problems, anxiety and depression.

A study from the University of Michigan found that spanking has the same effects as adverse childhood experiences, or ACES, for children – traumatic experiences that impact and jeopardize a child’s future. with a higher risk for physical and mental health problems.

Timeout used correctly

Replacing physical discipline, “time-out” was introduced to give parents another strategy, Goodwin said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and pediatricians have recommended its use by time-out as a result of their behavior and to help calm children down. But that happened recent controversy over the years about time-out being harmful or further traumatizing a child.

“However, research consistently supports timeout as an effective method and research has also found no association with negative outcomes for timeout,” Goodwin said.

However, it is important that it is done correctly. Surveys have shown that time-out is used incorrectly by many parents. Goodwin says it should not be used in a harsh or punitive manner

“It really just means telling your child… ‘You hit your sister,’ for example, and ‘now we’re going to take a time-out to calm down.’ And if it’s really presented as an opportunity for everyone to calm down and take a break from the situation, it can be very effective for children,” she said.

Goodwin also said that timeouts are only effective when a child has mostly warm and loving interactions with his parents.

“We’re thinking about using a lot of these strategies in a holistic way,” she said.

Best practices of time-out include being boring (i.e. not a toy) and having a short duration.

What about the “gentle parenting” movement?

Gentle parenting has become popular among influencers and social media. Although Goodwin said it is not clearly defined, the general idea is to value self-care in a child.

“(That includes) unconditional acceptance of children, empathy for children, respect for children. And these are all incredible principles,” Goodwin said. But she questions the movement when it recommends not using many evidence-based strategies.

“Many proponents of gentle parenting say there should be no externally imposed consequences for children,” she said. “We really have no evidence to support these claims about consequences, timeout, praise and rewards.”

She added that it’s important to know what works best for your child. “If gentle parenting works for you, that’s great,” Goodwin said. But she added that parents don’t have to worry about feeling like they’ve failed at parenting if they have to use consequences like time-out.

“It’s all about what works best for each individual, and there’s a lot of research showing that what’s really important is that parents are attuned to their individual child and what works,” she said.

Listen to the episode