Home

Countries of the World

My interests are in developing more knowledge to reduce violence against children and Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), with the aim of improving child and family well-being. It is my hope that a better understanding of how to reduce violence against children, and how to reduce ACEs, will contribute to a better understanding of how to improve mental health and well-being across the lifespan. In this research I try to understand the family and community origins of aggression, antisocial behavior, anxiety and depression across diverse communities and contexts. My current research focuses on parenting and child development using international data. I try to understand these issues within the context of current conversations about children’s rights.

A particular focus of my work has been to examine the outcomes of physical punishment.

“Corporal punishment is the most common form of violence against children worldwide, leading to the injury and death of thousands of children each year. Its very widespread social acceptance means that a level of violence in childrearing is normalised, entrenching children’s low status and paving the way for other forms of violence and mistreatment.” (End Violence Against Children & End Corporal Punishment, 2022)

“The magnitude of violence against children is staggering. Globally, the most pervasive form of violence against children is corporal punishment. Because it often occurs in the confines of homes and other settings where children live, study and play, it is largely hidden and challenging to detect. Worldwide, it is estimated that nearly one billion children are hit, slapped, spanked, pinched, or otherwise physically punished regularly by their parents, caregivers, teachers, or other trusted adults, the same individuals responsible for nurturing, protecting, and educating them (UNICEF, 2017; World Health Organization, 2020).” (Stewart-Tufescu, 2023)

More broadly, UNICEF (2024) Reports:

“1.6 billion children (2 in 3) regularly face violent punishment at home; more than two thirds are subjected to both physical punishment and psychological aggression.”

Our meta-analytic review of 50 years of research on the outcomes of physical punishment (Gershoff & Grogan-Kaylor, 2016) demonstrated that physical punishment is associated with a wide variety of negative outcomes [learn more], and has been part of several national level policy discussions on parenting. In 2018, the American Academy of Pediatrics passed a policy statement discouraging the use of physical punishment of children (Sege et al., 2019). Our meta-analysis was cited in that policy statement. Referring to our work, the policy statement indicated that “A 2016 meta-analysis showed that current literature does not support the finding of benefit from physical punishment in the long-term.” Similarly, in early 2019, the American Psychological Association also passed a resolution discouraging the use of physical punishment (American Psychological Association, 2019). This policy statement also cited our meta-analysis.

Some research suggests that the effects of spanking–as well as other Adverse Childhood Experiences–may persist well into adulthood (Afifi et al., 2017; Gershoff & Grogan-Kaylor, 2016; Merrick et al., 2017). Additional quantitative work has demonstrated that the effects of spanking are evident even in contexts when physical punishment is used minimally, or when used in ostensibly “normative” ways. In a number of papers, we have investigated these associations across diverse communities and countries. Lastly, in additional papers, we have worked to demonstrate more “causally robust” associations between physical punishment and undesirable child outcomes using a variety of quantitative methods (e.g. Cuartas et al., 2020; Grogan-Kaylor, 2004, 2005; Ma et al., 2018; Ward et al., 2020).

A more recent stream of research pays particular attention to parenting and child development across low and middle income countries (LMIC’s). Countries that are not high-income countries are under-represented in current social research (Henrich et al., 2010), particularly research on parenting and child development (Draper et al., 2022). We have examined the degree to which the association of particular parental discipline behaviors with child outcomes varies across a large number of countries. We have found some modest between country variation in these associations, but more importantly, have found a large degree of consistency in the degree to which parenting is associated with child outcomes across countries (Pace et al., 2019; Ward et al., 2023).

In this new stream of research, we examine a broader range of parenting behaviors, with a particular emphasis on “positive parenting” strategies (e.g. Ward et al., 2022, 2023). From this research, a positive discipline behavior that has emerged as being associated with better child outcomes is “explain[ing] why (child)’s behaviour was wrong.” (Ward et al., 2023)

Further, we are beginning to examine the association of more macro-level, or structural, factors with parenting and children’s outcomes. Most recently we have been focusing on the association of gender inequality with physical abuse, parental discipline, and child outcomes (Ma et al., 2022; Ward et al., 2024).

I teach courses mostly in the area of statistics, quantitative methods and data visualization.

References

Afifi, T. O., Ford, D., Gershoff, E. T., Merrick, M., Grogan-Kaylor, A., Ports, K. A., MacMillan, H. L., Holden, G. W., Taylor, C. A., Lee, S. J., & Bennett, R. P. (2017). Spanking and adult mental health impairment: The case for the designation of spanking as an adverse childhood experience. Child Abuse and Neglect, 71, 24–31. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2017.01.014

American Psychological Association. (2019). Resolution on physical discipline of children by parents [Report]. American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/about/policy/physical-discipline.pdf

Cuartas, J., McCoy, D. C., Grogan-Kaylor, A., & Gershoff, E. (2020). Physical punishment as a predictor of early cognitive development: Evidence from econometric approaches. Developmental Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1037/dev0001114

Draper, C. E., Barnett, L. M., Cook, C. J., Cuartas, J. A., Howard, S. J., McCoy, D. C., Merkley, R., Molano, A., Maldonado-Carreño, C., Obradovic, J., Scerif, G., Valentini, N. C., Venetsanou, F., & Yousafzai, A. K. (2022). Publishing child development research from around the world: An unfair playing field resulting in most of the world’s child population under-represented in research. Infant and Child Development, n/a, e2375. https://doi.org/10.1002/icd.2375

End Violence Against Children, & End Corporal Punishment. (2022). Corporal punishment – 10 key messages [Report]. End Corporal Punishment. https://www.end-violence.org/

Gershoff, E. T., & Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2016). Spanking and child outcomes: Old controversies and new meta-analyses. Journal of Family Psychology, 30, 453–469. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0000191

Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2004). The effect of corporal punishment on antisocial behavior in children. Social Work Research, 28, 153–162. https://doi.org/10.1093/swr/28.3.153

Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2005). Relationship of corporal punishment and antisocial behavior by neighborhood. Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 159, 938–942. https://doi.org/10.1001/archpedi.159.10.938

Henrich, J., Heine, S. J., & Norenzayan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X0999152X

Ma, J., Grogan-Kaylor, A. C., Lee, S. J., Ward, K. P., & Pace, G. T. (2022). Gender inequality in low- and middle-income countries: Associations with parental physical abuse and moderation by child gender. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 19. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph191911928

Ma, J., Grogan-Kaylor, A., & Lee, S. J. (2018). Associations of neighborhood disorganization and maternal spanking with children’s aggression: A fixed-effects regression analysis. Child Abuse and Neglect, 76, 106–116. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2017.10.013

Merrick, M. T., Ports, K. A., Ford, D. C., Afifi, T. O., Gershoff, E. T., & Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2017). Unpacking the impact of adverse childhood experiences on adult mental health. Child Abuse & Neglect, 69, 10–19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2017.03.016

Pace, G. T., Lee, S. J., & Grogan-Kaylor, A. (2019). Spanking and young children’s socioemotional development in low- and middle-income countries. Child Abuse and Neglect, 88, 84–95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.11.003

Sege, R. D., Siegel, B. S., on Child Abuse, C., eglect, on Psychosocial Aspects, C., & amily Health. (2019). Effective discipline to raise healthy children. Pediatrics, 143, e20183609. https://doi.org/10.1542/peds.2018-3609

Stewart-Tufescu, A. (2023). Corporal punishment: The global picture. The Canadian Journal of Children’s Rights / Revue Canadienne Des Droits Des Enfants, 10. https://doi.org/10.22215/cjcr.v10i1

UNICEF. (2017). A familiar face: Violence in the lives of children and adolescents [Report]. UNICEF.

UNICEF. (2024). FAST FACTS: Violence against children widespread, affecting millions globally. https://www.unicef.org/press-releases/fast-facts-violence-against-children-widespread-affecting-millions-globally

Ward, K. P., Grogan-Kaylor, A. C., Ma, J., Pace, G. T., Lee, S. J., & Davis-Kean, P. E. (2024). Interactions of gender inequality and parental discipline predicting child aggression in low- and middle-income countries. Child Development, n/a. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.14152

Ward, K. P., Grogan-Kaylor, A. C., Ma, J., Pace, G., & Lee, S. J. (2023). Associations between 11 parental discipline behaviors and child outcomes across 60 countries. BMJ Open. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-058439

Ward, K. P., Lee, S. J., Grogan-Kaylor, A. C., Ma, J., & Pace, G. T. (2022). Patterns of caregiver aggressive and nonaggressive discipline toward young children in low- and middle-income countries: A latent class approach. Child Abuse & Neglect, 128. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2022.105606

Ward, K. P., Lee, S. J., Pace, G. T., Grogan-Kaylor, A., & Ma, J. (2020). Attachment style and the association of spanking and child externalizing behavior. Academic Pediatrics, 20, 501–507. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acap.2019.06.017

World Health Organization. (2020). Global status report on preventing violence against children 2020 [Report]. World Health Organization. https://www.unicef.org/sites/default/files/2020-06/Global-status-report-on-preventing-violence-against-children-2020.pdf