Parents who shout at their children or call them “stupid” are leaving their offspring at greater risk of self-harm, drug use and ending up in jail, new research claims.

Talking harshly to children should be recognised as a form of abuse because of the huge damage it does, experts say.

The authors of a new study into such behaviour say “adult-to-child perpetration of verbal abuse … is characterised by shouting, yelling, denigrating the child, and verbal threats”.

“These types of adult actions can be as damaging to a child’s development as other currently recognised and forensically established subtypes of mistreatment such as childhood physical and sexual abuse,” the academics say in their paper in the journal Child Abuse & Neglect.

  • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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    1 year ago

    Maybe shouting at children all the time until they leave home is about the same as them getting sexually abused once.

    But they aren’t equivalent in the slightest when compared in the same quantities.

    • ██████████@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      yea if my dad only yelled and never hit me

      well i wouldnt like hitting people idk

      but seriously Any communication is better than cell phone babies

      i wish dad yelled insults at me

      he never calls now, i should call him

      be a better man