Causal Evidence for Exclusively Positive Parenting and for Timeout: Rejoinder to Holden, Grogan-Kaylor, Durrant, and Gershoff (2017)

Abstract

In our initial article we raised concerns about a paradigm we called “Exclusively Positive Parenting” (EPP). This paradigm opposes all negative disciplinary consequences, including timeout and privilege removal. We argued that the empirical support for EPP was insufficient. Researchers should not rely on insufficient causal evidence to replace well-established parenting perspectives that combine positive parenting with appropriate firm control. In reply, Holden et al. defended EPP. In this rejoinder to them we do two things. First, we use their citations to evaluate the limited causal evidence (four randomized studies) for what EPP supports. Second, we summarize the evidence for timeout, which EPP opposes. To do that, we offer the first known meta-analysis of the overall effectiveness of timeout, based on 24 studies with strong causal evidence for its effectiveness with young oppositional defiant children (6 randomized clinical studies; 18 small-N experimental designs). We call for parenting researchers to synthesize positive parenting techniques and disciplinary consequences based on adequate causal evidence.

Keywords:

• behavioral parent training
• causal inference
• child discipline
• positive parenting
• timeout

Note

Notes

1 The only exception involved an 8-year-old child who would not cooperate with timeout. After the therapist discovered that the parents gave “almost no individual attention [to the child] except when [she] was punished,” he asked each parent to provide the girl at least five minutes of individual positive attention each day, whereupon the violent tantrums decreased, as did the frequency with which she “picked on” her 5- and 6-year-old sisters (Thelen, 1979, p. 140). The effectiveness of timeout depends on its contrast with positive reinforcement for cooperation.