The research concludes that about inconsistent punishment with spankings and also parents who only do it when they're angry with their child and not having had set clear rules for the child Before the punishment.
I've seen plenty of children who were good and healthy and their parents spanked them, and plenty of kids who were bad and their parents spanked them. It boils down to the method of How they spank them.
Do they shout abusively at their child and demand they shut up after getting a spanking? Did they spank their child for something that could have been solved another way, or something that wasn't deserving of a spanking? Are they Consistent with their punishments?
My mother was consistent. I would do something wrong, she would ask me if I knew what I did, I'd explain it to her, she would get me to reason if I thought it was right or wrong. I'd almost always answer " wrong." and it helped me develop reasoning skills and nurtured abstract thinking.
If I did the wrong thing again, even knowing that it's wrong, mother would give me a punishment of not getting to do something, next offence was to be greeted with a time out. The third offence was final, a spanking. And I never did it again, not because I feared her hurting me, but because she helped me realize that I hurt her and disappointed her when I did something I knew was bad. I was raised with spankings as a Tool.
Not a means to release anger, but a means to Teach. It is a tool, the spanking itself isn't abusive, the person administering it in the wrong way is.
