Pediatric Practice & Research, vol.11, no.3, pp.116-124, 2023 (Peer-Reviewed Journal)
Aim: Parenting is the process of supporting children in their
physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development.
Parental violence against children is widespread throughout
the world. Given the harmful effects of physical punishment,
it is important to explore alternative disciplinary methods and
promote positive parenting styles. The aim of this study was to
investigate the attitudes of parents and their use of physical
punishment.
Material and Method: This descriptive cross-sectional study
was conducted at the Pediatrics Outpatient Clinic of İstanbul
Medipol University Hospital between June and December 2022.
The study included consenting parents who had children aged
between 2 and 6 years and who applied to the clinic during this
period. Participants (n:117) completed a questionnaire about
socio-demographic characteristics, the 'Parental Attitude Scale'
and the use of physical punishment.
Results: The study included 117 parents with children aged 2-6
years. Most participants were mothers (78,44%, n=91) with a
mean age of 35.02±4.11 years. The total number of children of
the participants was 117 and 59 (50.4%) of the children were
male. Seventy-seven (83.7%) of the mothers were university
graduates. Seventy-one (65.1%) of the participants had only
one child. The main characteristic of the parents' attitudes
was democracy with a score of 74.99±9.92. Only permissive
attitudes were found to be statistically significantly higher
among middle- and high-income parents than among low-
income parents. Among the participants, 41.6% (n:47) reported
using any form of punishment, 16.1% (n:18) reported using
physical punishment and 74.1% (n:86) reported using verbal
punishment/violence.
Conclusion: In our study, it is noteworthy that although the
participant parents exhibited a democratic attitude in the
foreground, physical punishment was used. Parenting and
disciplinary practices should be evaluated during child health
follow-up and the family should be mentored about possible
damaging disciplinary methods. Appropriate parenting styles
can help families develop positive parenting characteristics
and promote the development of mentally healthy children.
More comprehensive studies are needed on this subject.
Keywords: Parenting, parental attitudes, physical punishment,
discipline