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In Reply to: Re: According to the late Dr. Joan McCord, Criminologist posted by Wondering on March 04, 2009 at 19:44:43:
Maybe I didn't give the full picture and context.
You are right in that it isn't a 100% rule. I was heavily abused, spanked and hit like you wouldn't believe, but didn't turn to a life of crime, more than I got into self-abusive situations like drugs and cults and bad relationships. It certainy ruined the relationship between me and my spankers/hitters. For a good long while I had such an emotional deficit and was not fully emotionally equipped to deal with the problems of raising my own children either. And I still have issues.
In my case, I was not violent to start with, and I wasn't being punished for being violent. But I can see that when it comes to children that have a propensity to violence, who use violence to solve problems, which seems to be genetic and observable already from early infancy, then the Dr. Joan McCord scenario would come into effect. In cases where children are violent and you say, "Don't hit or I'll hit you!" then I think there is something deficient about that strategy, and yes, the child's emotional logic would be, "Why can you hit but not me?"
To be certain, it's always a combination of factors between genetics and environment, and researchers never underplay this fact.
I am quite certain from my own observations in my life and from working with children, that using violence on violent children only worsens their condition. When I worked as a teacher, the children I had who were violent, as a rule were treated violently at home. So there has to be a correlation somewhere. But you are right in that parenting has to be factored in.
Then again, I know model parents, super parents, who have violent children.
