Most children exposed to violence as form of discipline: Study

Marks on the legs of a pupil after she was caned by a teacher. A study has shown that children experience violence across all stages of childhood and in all settings. PHOTO | LABAN WALLOGA NATION MEDIA GROUP

East or West, home is not always the best for children under the age of five globally, a new report by Unicef shows.

Nine out of 10 children under the age of five live in countries where corporal punishment is not fully prohibited at home, while three quarters of the world’s two-to-four-year-old children, around 300 million of them, experience psychological aggression or physical punishment by their care givers at home in the guise of discipline.

“The harm inflicted on children around the world is truly worrying,” said Unicef chief of child protection Cornelius Williams.

On the flip side, 1.1 billion of care givers justify physical punishment as “a necessary form of punishment,” the report notes.

What is even more worrying, however, is that children as young as 12 months are experiencing violence, often by those entrusted to take care of them.

“Babies slapped in the face; girls and boys forced into sexual acts; adolescents murdered in their communities — violence against children spares no one and knows no boundaries,” stated Mr Williams.

The study, titled “A Familiar Face: Violence in the Lives of Children and Adolescents,” uses the latest data to show that children experience violence across all stages of childhood and in all settings.

Parents and teachers have been highlighted as the most likely familiar people to expose children and adolescents to violence as a form of discipline.

About 732 million school-age children, or half the global population aged six to 17, live in countries where they are not legally protected from corporal punishment at school.