Dr Justin Thomas is a chartered health psychologist with the British Psychological Society, the author of 'Psychological Well-being in the Gulf States' and a columnist for The National
May 17, 2022
There is a hidden camera TV show that roams the middle east capturing everyday people's reactions to staged scenarios. The show is called Al Sadma (the shock). A recent airing featured a father apparently maltreating his young son in public. This emotionally provocative episode reignited the debate about physical punishment and whether smacking a child is ever OK. The Al Sadma viewers, like audiences in general, were split, with voices on both sides of the physical punishment divide.
Physical punishment advocates worldwide tend to say things like: "my parents hit me; it never did me any harm." Perhaps the harm is the belief that it's OK to hit children. However, most of those who think hitting is OK tend to qualify their stance, advocating a light-handed approach with only minimal force. But how hard is too hard, and do we need to re-calibrate based on the child's age and body mass? Where exactly do we draw the line?
There is no universally agreed consensus about the exact point physical punishment becomes physical abuse. Within some legal frameworks, if the discipline leaves welts, bruises or contusions, it is considered abuse. Even with such a definition, we still need to ask what are the effects of beatings that do not leave marks on a child's developing mind.
A study published last year in The Journal of Pediatrics found that physical punishment (spanking/smacking) had similar associations to childhood emotional problems as other well-established risk factors, including physical abuse and neglect, parental incarceration and exposure to intimate partner violence.
Good parenting is as susceptible to an adult's emotions as it is a child's. AP
The study in question involved looking at data for 2380 families over four years. The analysis was part of a larger project known as the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study led by Princeton and Columbia Universities in the US. The study's authors concluded that the physical punishment of young children is likely to harm physical and mental health.
Of course, when physical punishment crosses the blurred line into physical abuse, it can have a devastating impact on health. Childhood physical abuse, however, is rarely an isolated event. It often occurs alongside other adversities such as emotional abuse, neglect, parental substance misuse and more. Therefore, any study wanting to understand the impact of physical abuse on mental health also needs to consider these other adversities.
Such a study was published in the journal Child Abuse and Neglect in 2007. This study involved over 2000 adults. Even after considering all other early-life adversities, demographics and the family environment, childhood physical abuse remained a strong predictor of ill-health across various physical and mental health conditions, including depression, anxiety, heart and liver disease and asthma.
The research suggests that childhood physical punishment and physical abuse are likely to negatively impact later-life health. So why do we continue to hit children? The answer often lies in our inability to adequately manage our emotions as parents.
One of the best predictors of whether physical punishment is administered or not is parental mood. The decision to smack or not smack can be totally independent of the child's actual behaviours. Parents who shrug off a behavioural misdemeanour on a happy day will come down hard on the same behaviours when they are in a bad mood. Parents learning to better manage their emotions is far kinder and more effective than subjecting children to inconsistent, mood-dependent physical punishment.
Childhood trauma is a risk factor for developing mental health problems later in life. EPA
Similarly, children are often a safe target for adults to redirect and vent their emotions upon: "You're just like your father." Psychologists call this trick-of-mind displacement. Sometimes, without even knowing it, we direct our anger towards a convenient rather than a deserving target; we let our hostility rain down on the vulnerable rather than the powerful.
Parenting can be incredibly rewarding. Unfortunately, it can also be super stressful, an unending emotional roller coaster. Hitting or generally maltreating a child is often (not always) an excellent example of maladaptive emotional reactivity – letting our emotions get the better of us. Managing stress and emotional reactivity is a vital part of parenting. Mindfulness and other stress management courses have become common in the workplace.
We need to do more to offer such courses to the parents of young children and especially to would-be and soon-to-be parents. Such a sustained initiative will, eventually, confine questions about whether it's OK to hit children to the dustbin of history where they belong.
Tamkeen's offering
Option 1: 70% in year 1, 50% in year 2, 30% in year 3
Option 2: 50% across three years
Option 3: 30% across five years
The Written World: How Literature Shaped History
Martin Puchner
Granta
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Name: Thndr Started: 2019 Co-founders: Ahmad Hammouda and Seif Amr Sector: FinTech Headquarters: Egypt UAE base: Hub71, Abu Dhabi Current number of staff: More than 150 Funds raised: $22 million
Lt Gen Erik Petersen, deputy chief of programs, US Army, has argued it took a “three decade holiday” on modernising tanks.
“There clearly remains a significant armoured heavy ground manoeuvre threat in this world and maintaining a world class armoured force is absolutely vital,” the general said in London last week.
“We are developing next generation capabilities to compete with and deter adversaries to prevent opportunism or miscalculation, and, if necessary, defeat any foe decisively.”
All the Money in the World
Director: Ridley Scott
Starring: Charlie Plummer, Mark Wahlberg, Michelle Williams, Christopher Plummer
