JAMAICA is ranked second in the world for 'caning' children, according to Dr Maureen Samms-Vaughan, executive chairman of the Early Childhood Commission (ECC). Samms-Vaughan says that while there is a dearth of information on the prevalence of corporal punishment, months of research shows that the Caribbean has the highest rate of corporal punishment in the world.

SAMMS-VAUGHAN... smacking does not permanently change

Samms-Vaughan cited a 1997 study in which 1,720 Jamaican children between ages 11 and 12 in Kingston and St Andrew were asked to complete a questionnaire about their experiences of violence as a case in point. She said the responses revealed that 97 per cent of these children had received corporal punishment at home, while 86 per cent were disciplined at school.

An earlier Jamaican study, using a sample of 75 economically deprived families, revealed that 79 per cent of the mothers polled had beaten their two to five year-olds with an implement.

The executive chairman also cited a 1994 study, which indicated that in Barbados - another Caribbean island - between 80 and 90 per cent of children had received corporal punishment in primary school and at home.

Egypt, she pointed out, also has a high corporal punishment rate in school, as denoted in a 1998 study, which indicated that 80 per cent of boys and 62 per cent of girls reported physical punishment administered by teachers.

In another study carried out in the same year in the United States, 35 per cent of parents smacked their infants and 94 per cent of the parents of toddlers used corporal punishment.

Corporal punishment is defined as the use of physical force, with the intention of causing a child to experience pain, but not injury, for the purposes of correction or control of the child's behaviour.

However, Samms-Vaughan pointed out that there was no information available on less severe forms of punishment, such as spanking with the hand in the study.

Although corporal punishment was abolished in Jamaica in 1998, Samms-Vaughan says the authoritarian nature of parenting in Jamaica and the Caribbean is the underlining contributor to the reason parents turn to corporal punishment to resolve conflicts between themselves and their children.

"The only good effect is that the child stops whatever they are doing, but it does not permanently change the behaviour of the child or teach moral reasoning," she argued.

In the 1997 study, majority of the children or 75 per cent received paddling at home because they were disobedient; 21 per cent for lying; 20. 7 per cent for "answering back," 17.9 for fighting; and 11 per cent for poor school work.

Samms-Vaughan said mothers were normally the main administrators of corporal punishment, which represented 73. 7 per cent, while 30.3 per cent of the children said they were disciplined by their fathers.

When it came to the types of corporal punishment the children received, Samms-Vaughan said 82.3 per cent experienced verbal aggression such as insults, while 87. 4 per cent of the children had experienced minor violence, such as throwing objects at the child, and 85 per cent said they experienced severe violence, which refers to beating the child with objects or 'roughing them up'.

"At home, genders had similar experiences except for the most severe forms of violence, which boys experience more," Samms-Vaughan added. She was making a presentation at the two-day conference hosted recently by the ECC under the theme "Emerging Concerns of the Early Childhood Period: HIV/AIDS and Violence."

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