Most parenting books and pediatric guidelines describe discipline in tidy, calm language: redirect, model, reinforce, repeat. Real households rarely work that way. Somewhere between a toddler meltdown in a grocery store and a teenager who has ignored the same request for the fifth time, parents reach for tactics they know are not exactly recommended, and then quietly hope nobody asks about it at the next pediatrician visit.
None of this makes anyone a bad parent. It makes them human, tired, and occasionally out of better options in the moment. Recent surveys and research from 2024 and 2025 suggest these habits were far more common than the parenting advice industry usually lets on.
1. Spanking, even after swearing they never would
1. Spanking, even after swearing they never would (Image Credits: Pexels)
Spanking has been declining generation by generation, yet it has not disappeared. A recent study covering thousands of adults found that around 45% of Gen X parents said they had spanked their children, more than twice the share reported among millennials and Gen Z, and even among younger parents, about one in five answered yes when asked whether they had ever struck a child with an open hand as punishment.
What makes this habit particularly loaded is the gap between intention and behavior. Older survey data has shown that 70 percent of parents who have spanked told themselves before having children that they would not spank unless absolutely necessary. A large national poll on toddler discipline also found that about a fifth of parents say they spank their offspring regularly and about 17% say they hit their kids with objects, such as a belt or a wooden spoon, even though most of them privately doubt it actually works.
2. Yelling until the whole house hears it
2. Yelling until the whole house hears it (Image Credits: Unsplash)
If spanking carries a stigma, yelling has quietly become the more socially acceptable substitute, largely because it leaves no visible mark. Research from the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Michigan found that severe verbal discipline from parents is particularly destructive to tweens and teens, and adolescents whose parents had been using yelling as a discipline method were more likely to have behavioral issues and to act out.
The scale of the habit is almost universal. A nationally representative survey cited by researchers found that about 90 percent of American parents reported one or more instances of using harsh verbal discipline with children of all ages, and among teenagers specifically, the rate of more severe forms like swearing and name calling directed at teens was 50 percent. Psychologists studying the pattern note that yelling tends to escalate rather than resolve conflict, since harsh verbal discipline may lead to a vicious cycle of children acting out, and parents escalating their disciplinary actions.
3. Empty threats parents never intend to keep
3. Empty threats parents never intend to keep (Image Credits: Pexels)
Few parenting confessions feel as universally recognizable as the holiday season classic: warning a misbehaving child that Santa is watching. A December 2024 national poll from the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital found that parents of children aged three to five are the most likely to use threats, and about 25% admitted threatening that Santa might not visit if misbehavior continued.
Santa is far from the only leverage point. The same research noted that many parents also reported threatening to leave an activity or place, taking away toys, or skipping dessert as a consequence. The trouble, according to the pediatrician who co-led the poll, is that follow through rarely happens, and empty threats undermine trust and credibility and aren’t usually effective.
4. Bribing for good behavior, then feeling a little guilty about it
4. Bribing for good behavior, then feeling a little guilty about it (Image Credits: Pexels)
Bribery might be the most quietly widespread habit on this list, largely because it works in the short term and rarely gets discussed out loud. The same Mott Poll found that nearly half of parents have turned to bribes to address difficult behavior, a figure echoed in a companion report noting that more than half of the parents polled said they sometimes have used incentives or bribery to encourage good behavior.
A closer breakdown from the poll itself showed the frequency was not occasional for everyone. Researchers reported that 9% of parents said they bribed a misbehaving child often, while 59% said they did so sometimes. Pediatricians involved in the research were careful not to condemn the habit outright, but cautioned that the type of reward matters, since food related incentives such as candy can create unhealthy associations.
5. Taking away the phone or tablet as the nuclear option
5. Taking away the phone or tablet as the nuclear option (Image Credits: Pexels)
For families with older kids, screens have become the modern equivalent of grounding, and removing them is often the first punishment parents reach for. A qualitative study of families managing adolescent screen use found that screens were not generally used as a reward, but the removal of a device or internet access was used as a punishment by some parents.
The research on whether this actually works is not encouraging. One study on parent child screen habits found that using screen time as a punishment often led children to seek out more mature content, while broader research on media parenting practices concluded that parental use of screens to control behavior, such as a reward or punishment, was associated with higher screen time and greater problematic video game use. Family researchers have also pointed out that punishments work best when tied to the actual misbehavior, since effective punishment should relate to the specific wrongdoing, grounding for missing curfew works better than removing phone privileges.
6. Going quiet instead of working it out
6. Going quiet instead of working it out (Image Credits: Pexels)
Not every discipline habit involves raised voices or lost privileges. Plenty of parents, when frustrated or emotionally maxed out, default to withdrawing warmth for a while rather than talking through the conflict, whether that looks like short answers, a cold shoulder, or simply leaving a room until things cool off. It is rarely planned as a strategy so much as a way of buying time when patience has already run out.
Parenting researchers generally describe this kind of emotional withdrawal as a softer cousin of harsh discipline, since it still relies on a child’s fear of disconnection rather than clear explanation. Unlike spanking or yelling, it leaves no obvious evidence and is almost never mentioned in parenting surveys, which may be exactly why so many parents use it without ever naming it out loud.
Final thoughts
Final thoughts (Image Credits: Pexels)
None of these six habits are secret in the sense that researchers do not know about them. Pediatric surveys have documented spanking, yelling, threats, bribery, and screen based punishment in detail over the past two years alone. What stays hidden is the personal admission, the moment a parent might say out loud that they do these things too, despite knowing better.
The gap between what parenting guidelines recommend and what actually happens on a hard Tuesday evening is probably never going to close completely. What seems to help most, according to the researchers behind these polls, is not perfection but consistency and follow through, paired with a willingness to notice which habits are worth loosening their grip on.