allow parental corporal punishment.4 Finally, a study published by the American Medical Association in 1997 suggests that the more a parent uses corporal punishment on a child, the worse his behavior will be over time. Report author Murray A. Straus who is a sociologist at the University of New Hampshire says that this is the first study that has been able to prove that spanking is not as productive as people think it is.5 Straus used data from 1986 to 1990 collected from interviews with 900 mothers. The research showed that over that 4 year span, the behavior of the children whose mothers didn't spank them was better. Mothers who spanked their children once or twice a week had a higher instance of misbehavior in their children. The highest of all were mothers who spanked their children 3 or more times during the week. Their behavior actually got worse over that 4-year period of time. In addition, anti-social behavior, which Straus defined as lying, cheating, bullying or being cruel to others, was 14
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