More than half of Taiwanese parents with children under the age of six use corporal punishment on their children, a recent survey conducted by the Taiwan Fund for Children and Families showed.
The group said that the results indicate a common lack of parental education and an alarming tendency for parents to vent their personal stress and anxiety on their children.
The survey was completed through information provided by 869 childcare-related professionals — including social workers, preschool educators, psychological counselors, medical workers and police officers.
It indicated that 57 percent of parents use corporal punishment on their children — most commonly slapping the child’s palms or buttocks; 31 percent tug their children; while 83 percent yelled at their kids.
A large majority, or 93 percent, of respondents said that parents required more parental education, while 73 percent said that parents brought about negative effects on their children as a result of stress and emotional instability.
The survey also found that parents were reluctant to seek professional assistance when they encountered problems in childcare.
Wang Sheng-chi (王聖基), director of the fund’s social work division, said that corporal punishment could easily escalate into severe acts of violence and cause irreversible damage on young children.
He said that the organization’s research has found that while many parents start with relatively minor punishments such as a slap on the palm, the severity of their punishment often increases with time.
“A lot of parents seem to think [of their children]: ‘You are supposed to understand what I mean, why do you not understand?’ which leads to more severe beatings,” Wang said.
According to statistics provided by the Ministry of Health and Welfare, there were 11,589 cases of child and teen abuse last year, with 23 percent of the children less than six years of age.
An essay competition jointly organized by a local writing society and a publisher affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) might have contravened the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and the Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例), the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said on Thursday. “In this case, the partner organization is clearly an agency under the CCP’s Fujian Provincial Committee,” MAC Deputy Minister and spokesperson Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “It also involves bringing Taiwanese students to China with all-expenses-paid arrangements to attend award ceremonies and camps,” Liang said. Those two “characteristics” are typically sufficient
The brilliant blue waters, thick foliage and bucolic atmosphere on this seemingly idyllic archipelago deep in the Pacific Ocean belie the key role it now plays in a titanic geopolitical struggle. Palau is again on the front line as China, and the US and its allies prepare their forces in an intensifying contest for control over the Asia-Pacific region. The democratic nation of just 17,000 people hosts US-controlled airstrips and soon-to-be-completed radar installations that the US military describes as “critical” to monitoring vast swathes of water and airspace. It is also a key piece of the second island chain, a string of
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake that struck about 33km off the coast of Hualien City was the "main shock" in a series of quakes in the area, with aftershocks expected over the next three days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Prior to the magnitude 5.9 quake shaking most of Taiwan at 6:53pm yesterday, six other earthquakes stronger than a magnitude of 4, starting with a magnitude 5.5 quake at 6:09pm, occurred in the area. CWA Seismological Center Director Wu Chien-fu (吳健富) confirmed that the quakes were all part of the same series and that the magnitude 5.5 temblor was
The Central Weather Administration has issued a heat alert for southeastern Taiwan, warning of temperatures as high as 36°C today, while alerting some coastal areas of strong winds later in the day. Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門) and Pingtung County’s Neipu Township (內埔) are under an orange heat alert, which warns of temperatures as high as 36°C for three consecutive days, the CWA said, citing southwest winds. The heat would also extend to Tainan’s Nansi (楠西) and Yujing (玉井) districts, as well as Pingtung’s Gaoshu (高樹), Yanpu (鹽埔) and Majia (瑪家) townships, it said, forecasting highs of up to 36°C in those areas
RSS