ITWire

The article 'The emergence of spanking among a representative sample of children under 2 years of age in North Carolina' is authored by Adam J. Zolotor, T. Walker Robinson, Desmond K. Runyan, and Robert A. Murphy, all of the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, U.S.A.), and Ronald G. Barr, of the University of British Columbia (Vancouver, BC, Canada).'

It was published online on June 24, 2011, within the journal Frontiers in Child and Neurodevelopmental Psychiatry.

The researchers studied nearly 3,000 mothers of children who were less than two years old living in North Carolina, within the United States.

A anonymous telephone survey was used, which was conducted between Oct. 1, 2005, and July 31, 2007.

Within the survey, it was found that 30% of the mothers had spanked their children within the last year.

Over 5% of mothers had spanked their children while they were less than 3 months of age.

And, over 70% of mothers of children less than 23 months old (almost 2 years) had reported spanking their children.

The authors found that spanking occurred more frequently as the child grew older. In fact the authors stated within their paper, 'With every month of age, a child had 27% increased odds of being spanked.'

They also found that spanking occurred more frequently with younger mothers.

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