Strengthening Causal Estimates for Links Between Spanking and Children’s Externalizing Behavior Problems
利用倾向得分匹配和滞后因变量，在大型全国代表性样本中估计打屁股对儿童外化行为问题的因果效应，发现5岁时被打屁股会预测6岁和8岁时外化行为问题的增加。
Establishing causal links when experiments are not feasible is an important challenge for psychology researchers. The question of whether parents' spanking causes children's externalizing behavior problems poses such a challenge because randomized experiments of spanking are unethical, and correlational studies cannot rule out potential selection factors. This study used propensity score matching based on the lifetime prevalence and recent incidence of spanking in a large and nationally representative sample ( N = 12,112) as well as lagged dependent variables to get as close to causal estimates outside an experiment as possible. Whether children were spanked at the age of 5 years predicted increases in externalizing behavior problems by ages 6 and 8, even after the groups based on spanking prevalence or incidence were matched on a range of sociodemographic, family, and cultural characteristics and children's initial behavior problems. These statistically rigorous methods yield the conclusion that spanking predicts a deterioration of children's externalizing behavior over time.