Dr. Murray Straus has studied the use of spanking and corporal punishment with children for decades, as a professor of sociology and founder and co-director of the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire.
He compares the research on spanking to studies on cigarettes – people use it because it seems right at the time, but that’s because they can’t see the long-term dangers.
Dr. Straus is one of the authors of the new book The Primordial Violence: Spanking Children, Psychological Development, Violence, and Crime. He talks with All Things Considered host Brady Carlson about the research.
