Parents and teachers who try to make their kids behave by subjecting them to humiliating punishments are taking the wrong approach to discipline, experts say. Just this month, a Florida teacher was suspended for making tardy students wear a wide-brimmed dog collar dubbed the ‘cone of shame.’ And parents in Minnesota who were disappointed with their daughter’s grades were arrested after they shaved the 12-year old girl’s head and forced her to wear a diaper and run around outside, Live Science reported.
While these cases are certainly extreme, experts say that any punishment that shames or embarrasses a child is not an effective way to discipline youngsters, and may cause long-term psychological damage. “The research is pretty clear that it’s never appropriate to shame a child, or to make a child feel degraded or diminished,” said Andy Grogan-Kaylor, an associate professor of social work at the University of Michigan. Such punishments can lead to “all kinds of problems in the future,” Grogan-Kaylor said, including increased anxiety, depression and aggression. Malicious punishments can also damage parents’ relationship with their child, and lead to a cycle of bad behavior, experts say. Instead, parents should use other discipline strategies such as setting clear rules for kids and taking away privileges.
Overall, parents should aim to create a supporting environment for their child. “Positive things have a much more powerful effect on shaping behaviour than any punishment,” Grogan-Kaylor said. Out-of-the norm punishments can have social repercussions for children, said Jennifer Lansford, a research professor at Duke Univesity’s Center for Child and Family Policy.
An odd punishment can make a child stand out, and provoke bullying, Lansford said. In addition, children evaluate their own experiences in the context of what they see their peers experiencing, Lansford said. If children are disciplined in ways that are not condoned by society, “it can lead children to perceive they are personally rejected by their parents,” Lansford said.
“Each time we [embarrass children with a punishment] we pay a price, and we drive them away from us, and we lose our ability to be a role model for them,” Kersey said. “When you disconnect from a child, he no longer wants to please you, he no longer wants to be like you. You’ve lost your power of influence over him,” Kersey said. Children who are punished in these ways usually still commit the behavior, but do it behind their parents’ backs, Kersey said.
