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No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

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Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#51
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hitting children is legal in the US?

No. Child abuse is taken seriously in the US, and hitting children in schools with get people fired, if not prosecuted. I'm sure it does still happen, but that does not mean it is widely accepted.

Since you are only talking about schools (also in the replies) I take it that it is legal at home, yes?

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#52
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Child abuse is taken seriously in the US, and hitting children in schools with get people fired, if not prosecuted. I'm sure it does still happen, but that does not mean it is widely accepted.

Since you are only talking about schools (also in the replies) I take it that it is legal at home, yes?

Abuse is not legal. Physical discipline is legal. Drawing the line between the two is up to the court system.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#53

This article is dangerous. On the surface it may sound good, but there is behavior so vile and harmful to the child, family or neighbors that never showing negative reinforcement is extremely dangerous with some children. It does have some merits though, showing plenty of positive reinforcement will likely reduce the amount of negative reinforcement needed.

I wonder how it equips children for the real world where there is both positive and negative reinforcement. If they only deal with positive reinforcement, will they have the emotional conditioning to deal with negative reinforcement. For example, dealing with a negative review or getting skipped for a promotion. Something we probably all experienced, getting yelled at by a manager.

Anecdotally, being raised by an asian mom. I was subjected to negative reinforcement of her disappointment if i didn't do well. I attribute that to both my and my sister success because we both didn't want to deal with the shame of failure.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#54
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how people think this is honest. You're clearly using your cognitive advantage (or in the case of a boss, usually an organizational info advantage) to trick the other person. I remember as I grew up noticing when adults were doing this, and I resented them for it. Why would I want my kids to feel that way about me?

Any cognitive advantage that is abused will be seen as manipulative, absolutely. The way to make "the illusion of choice" work is to be selective about it. You start out by giving the 4 year old the illusion of choice (the jacket or the sweater), but what you're really doing is coaching the child to make appropriate decisions. After a few times, you won't have to give the child the choice anymore, because they will k…

You're justifying it as being in the child's (or employee's) interest, but you're not actually denying the transgression.

Lying becomes less worse when you lie for someone else's benefit but (1) that doesn't make it not lying, (2) the other person can still rightfully resent it, (3) you generally shouldn't trust yourself to only lie in another's interest. Regarding the last one: I often see normal, reasonably good parents lie to their children just to get relief, and I'm sure they can justify it to themselves as in the child's interest, but it's really just self-serving.

(You can replace "lie" with "white lie", "trick", or whatever euphemism you want for this mild, but real, transgression.)

I think one good check on this is whether the child would be OK with it after-the-fact, assuming some hypothetical wisdom and hindsight (like becoming an adult). If they aren't OK with it, then you probably shouldn't do it. And I'm telling you right now: as an adult, I don't like the fact that adults did this to me when I was a child.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#55
(Edit: I'm detaching this from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13101402 and marking it off-topic. That example wasn't a clear enough one to make the point about, because the commenter wasn't being snarky or doing anything particularly wrong. Maybe next time it comes up more clearly I'll try again.)

I know it's nitpicky, but please don't use quotation marks when you're not actually quoting someone, and especially not when putting words in someone's mouth for rhetorical effect. (That generally isn't a great thing to do either, but was harmless in this case because you did it to praise, not denounce.)

We ask this, partly because the internet is stateless and text fragments are prone to misinterpretation, but also because it's one of those things that subtly degrade substantive discussion.

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#56
post #18

> Tone of voice dictates whether you're going to get compliance or not. "Sarah, put on the green coat or the red sweater. We're going to go out, okay?" Choice among humans increases the likelihood of compliance. And choice isn't important, it's the appearance of choice that's important. Having real choice is not the issue, humans don't feel too strongly about that, but having the feeling that you have a choice makes…

Does he favor the Republican or Democrat side of his face?

(Locke was onto something ...)

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#57
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand how people think this is honest. You're clearly using your cognitive advantage (or in the case of a boss, usually an organizational info advantage) to trick the other person. I remember as I grew up noticing when adults were doing this, and I resented them for it. Why would I want my kids to feel that way about me?

It's not "tricking", unless you're letting your toddler dictate whether you should leave the house. Toddlers don't have a choice over that; instead, you're giving the toddler a choice appropriate to their level. That helps build their cognitive abilities and takes the focus away from whether they want to leave the house (a choice they shouldn't make), to whether they want the sweater or coat (a choice reasonable for…

You're using a cognitive advantage to distract them from expressing displeasure about something they reasonably don't like. Just because the toddler doesn't have a say over whether you're leaving the house doesn't mean you're not tricking him.

If two people are dating, the boyfriend is well within his rights to unilaterally break off the relationship. But if he broached the issue with his girlfriend by saying "Would you rather be just friends or simply not see each other any more?" in order to distract her from the breakup, she would rightfully be resentful. (That example is extreme to illustrate the point, but the idea is the same.)

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#58
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any cognitive advantage that is abused will be seen as manipulative, absolutely. The way to make "the illusion of choice" work is to be selective about it. You start out by giving the 4 year old the illusion of choice (the jacket or the sweater), but what you're really doing is coaching the child to make appropriate decisions. After a few times, you won't have to give the child the choice anymore, because they will k…

You're justifying it as being in the child's (or employee's) interest, but you're not actually denying the transgression. Lying becomes less worse when you lie for someone else's benefit but (1) that doesn't make it not lying, (2) the other person can still rightfully resent it, (3) you generally shouldn't trust yourself to only lie in another's interest. Regarding the last one: I often see normal, reasonably good pa…

On that note: On the Decay of the Art of Lying, by Mark Twain: http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2572/pg2572.html

Re: No Spanking, No Time-Out, No Problems

#60
post #21
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is in the context of the US where violence against the child is common place; widely accepted; even if the parent has used a weapon to do so; even if it's not a parent but a school[1]; and where there's no hope that hitting children will ever become illegal. [1] a weirdly large number of schoolchildren are still hit in the US.

Hitting children is legal in the US?

Yes. There isn't a single US state where corporal punishment by parents is illegal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporal_punishment_in_the_hom...

> Corporal punishment of children by parents or other legal guardians is legal in the United States and social acceptance is generally high, through allowances made for "moderate physical discipline" (using this or similar language) in most states' laws regarding assault, criminal battery, domestic violence and/or child abuse. Whether an instance of corporal punishment exceeds these bounds is usually decided on a case-by-case basis in family court proceedings.

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