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.

  • SpiderShoeCult
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    1 year ago

    I also get adrenaline rushes and instinctively angry when loud noises that can be avoided, happen.

    I have also developed (without going for it) some very good stealth skills and I am not an especially tiny person.

    I also grew up with a fairly short temper, though I wonder if it’s genetics or the upbringing. Learned over time I can control it, but the berserker rage is still there.