relationship between corporal punishment and the mental health and social competence of female students aged 13 to 18 in District 2 of Tehran

Afshari, Freshte; Afshari, Freshte; Ghadiri, Somayeh

doi:10.22034/naes.2025.559751.1814

relationship between corporal punishment and the mental health and social competence of female students aged 13 to 18 in District 2 of Tehran

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Freshte Afshari ¹

Freshte Afshari ²

Somayeh Ghadiri ³

¹ Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

² Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran, Iran

³ Roudehen Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran.

10.22034/naes.2025.559751.1814

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the relationship between corporal punishment and the mental health and social competence of female students aged 13 to 18 in District 2 of Tehran. In terms of purpose, the research was basic, and in terms of data collection method, it was descriptive-correlational with a regression design. The statistical population consisted of all female secondary school students in District 2 of Tehran during the 2023-2024 academic year. A sample of 285 participants was selected using a non-random sampling method. The research instruments included the Misbehavior Assessment Questionnaire(Demareh, 1995), the Social Competence Questionnaire(Felner et al., 1990), and the short form of the Mental Health Questionnaire(Keyes, 2002). Data were analyzed using Pearson’s correlation coefficient and simple linear regression analysis. The results indicated that corporal punishment has a significant negative relationship with mental health(r = -0.527) and social competence(r = -0.516) and is able to explain 27.8% of the variance in mental health and 26.6% of the variance in social competence(p < 0.01). The findings of this study highlight the destructive role of corporal punishment on adolescents’ psychosocial indicators and underscore the need to design educational interventions for teachers and parents to promote positive disciplinary methods and create supportive educational environments.

Keywords

Corporal punishment

mental health

social competence

students

Subjects