Poll: one in three Finns approve of corporal punishment of children

Over 90% know corporal punishment is illegal

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One in three Finns approve of corporal punishment of children. According to a survey by the Central Union for Child Welfare in Finland, men are more ready to approve of smacking than women. One in four women say that they would approve of hitting a child at least in exceptional circumstances.
      The poll was taken in June through August this year, and involved interviews with more than 2,000 Finns aged 15 to 79.
      Just under one fifth of childless Finns aged 15 to 45 said that they would be likely to use corporal punishment if they have children.
     
"The result of the study is strange in that more than 90% of the people know that physical punishment is illegal", notes researcher Heikki Sariola of the Central Union for Child Welfare.
      Corporal punishment was outlawed in Finland in 1984. Sariola is pleased that attitudes toward hitting children have become at least slightly more negative. In a study conducted in 1981 nearly half of Finns approved or corporal punishment.
      The survey on Finnish attitudes toward bringing up children was conducted after the issue of punishment had been discussed on Internet message boards, says the group’s information officer Annamaija Puonti.
      "People on the message boards insist that it is all right, and desirable, to punish children physically. This is a cause for concern; the Internet is a place for peer-group support, where parents seek advice from each other on how to bring up children."
     
Respondents to the survey were not asked if they had punished their children by hitting them; as the interviews were conducted in person, the researchers felt that honest answers would be difficult to come by.
      Surveys conducted among schoolchildren indicate that corporal punishment still takes place. For instance, a study on school health conducted by the National Research and Development Centre for Welfare and Health (STAKES) last year showed that 21% of pupils in the ninth grade had been punished physically by their parents.


Links:
  Central Union for Child Welfare in Finland

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