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. 2012 May-Jun;83(3):838-43.
doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01732.x. Epub 2012 Feb 3.

Longitudinal links between spanking and children's externalizing behaviors in a national sample of White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian American families

Elizabeth T Gershoff  1 , Jennifer E Lansford, Holly R Sexton, Pamela Davis-Kean, Arnold J Sameroff
Affiliations

Longitudinal links between spanking and children's externalizing behaviors in a national sample of White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian American families

Elizabeth T Gershoff et al. Child Dev. 2012 May-Jun.

Abstract

This study examined whether the longitudinal links between mothers' use of spanking and children's externalizing behaviors are moderated by family race/ethnicity, as would be predicted by cultural normativeness theory, once mean differences in frequency of use are controlled. A nationally representative sample of White, Black, Hispanic, and Asian American families (n = 11,044) was used to test a cross-lagged path model from 5 to 8 years old. While race/ethnic differences were observed in the frequency of spanking, no differences were found in the associations of spanking and externalizing over time: Early spanking predicted increases in children's externalizing while early child externalizing elicited more spanking over time across all race/ethnic groups.

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Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Results from kindergarten to third-grade cross-lag model of spanking and child externalizing behavior for the full sample (N = 11,044). ***p < .001.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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