Correlates of Parental Choice of Child Discipline Methods in Ghana: A Multilevel Modeling Approach

This study applied multilevel modeling to investigate the impact of observed predictors and different levels or groups that households belong, on parents’ choice of discipline methods using data from 8156 households derived from a nationwide survey by the Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) in 2011. The aim of the study is to provide in-depth information on why parents choose particular discipline methods as corrective measures to reduce unwanted child behaviour in the present and to increase desirable ones in the future. The results of the study show that, religion and age-group of household heads have significant effect on household’s likelihood to choose physical discipline methods whereas the wealth index of a household and ethnicity of the household head, have significant effect on households’ likelihood to choose non-physical and psychological aggression methods. The results further show significant contextual effect on the differences in choices of parents at the household and regional levels. The choice of physical discipline methods by parents was consistent across households and regional levels unlike non-physical and psychological aggression methods whose application varied across the regions. Households in the Northern, Eastern and Volta regions mostly chose to apply physical discipline methods whereas in the Upper West, Western and Northern regions the most chosen discipline methods were non-physical discipline methods. Psychological aggression discipline methods were predominantly applied in the Upper East, Central and Northern regions of the country.