I was invited to contribute this essay to the winter edition of the U.S. Alliance to End the Hitting of Children’s newsletter.

Violence toward children is often justified as discipline, tradition, or cultural necessity. From a developmental and clinical perspective, however, hitting a child represents a profound disruption of bonding at the very stage when the human mind is organizing itself around safety, meaning, and trust. The effects of this disruption do not end in childhood; they shape how violence is transmitted across generations.

Bonding is often misunderstood as something inherently gentle. In fact, bonding simply refers to how human beings register one another through contact. A handshake is a form of bonding—brief, reciprocal, and regulated. A hug conveys warmth and containment. Striking a child is also a form of bonding, but one........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)