Preliminary Investigation of the Use of Last-Resort Tactics to Discipline Toddlers

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine last-resort tactics used by mothers of toddlers. Participants in this study were 31 mothers and their children between the ages of 18 and 30 months old from central Oklahoma. The mothers completed questionnaires on demographics, discipline practices, and child behaviors at an interview assessment and a follow-up phone call. This study found that a wide range of last-resort tactics were used by mothers of toddlers and that physical punishment is still widely used as a last-resort tactic despite the controversy of whether to ban its use. Older toddlers within this age range were disciplined with more forceful last-resort tactics when compared to younger toddlers. This study also found there a wide range of responses concerning how negatively mothers felt when using their last-resort tactic. Negative affect was marginally associated with externalizing problems and rated difficulty of daily problems in children. The frequency of last-resort tactics was marginally correlated with higher levels of effortful control in children, whether last-resort tactics were physical or non-physical. More forceful last-resort tactics were marginally correlated with greater externalizing problems, and children disciplined with physical last-resort tactics had significantly higher levels of externalizing problems when compared to children disciplined with non-physical last-resort tactics. When considering both type of last-resort tactic and negative affect simultaneously, both variables predicted greater externalizing problems in children. Longitudinal data are necessary to tell whether these associations are due to parent or child effects or a third factor.