YOUNG VIETNAMESE PEOPLE AND CHILDHOOD CORPORAL PUNISHMENT a NARRATIVE INQUIRY = NGƯỜI VIỆT TRẺ và TRẢI NGHIỆM đòn ROI THUỞ NHỎ một NGHIÊN cứu tự sự

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF LINGUISTICS AND CULTURE OF ENGLISH-SPEAKING COUNTRIES

GRADUATION PAPER

YOUNG VIETNAMESE PEOPLE AND
CHILDHOOD CORPORAL PUNISHMENT:
A NARRATIVE INQUIRY

Supervisor: Nguyễn Thanh Hà, PhD.
Student: Tống Khánh Linh
Course: QH2017.F1.E1

HANOI – 2021


ĐẠI HỌC QUỐC GIA HÀ NỘI
TRƯỜNG ĐẠI HỌC NGOẠI NGỮ
KHOA NGƠN NGỮ VÀ VĂN HĨA CÁC NƯỚC NĨI TIẾNG ANH

KHĨA LUẬN TỐT NGHIỆP

NGƯỜI VIỆT TRẺ VÀ TRẢI NGHIỆM ĐÒN ROI THUỞ
NHỎ: MỘT NGHIÊN CỨU TỰ SỰ

Giáo viên hướng dẫn: Nguyễn Thanh Hà, PhD.
Sinh viên: Tống Khánh Linh
Khóa: QH2017.F1.E1

HÀ NỘI – 2021

Signatures of Approval:
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Supervisor’s comments and suggestion:
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________


Acceptance page
I hereby state that I: Tống Khánh Linh, class of QH2017.F1.E1), being a candidate for
the degree of Bachelor of Arts (programme) accept the requirements of the College
relating to the retention and use of Bachelor’s Graduation Paper deposited in the library.
In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library
should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the
normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan or reproduction of the
paper.

Signature

Date


Acknowledgements
This paper would not have been completed without the enormous help and support of my
supervisor, Ms. Thanh Ha. She has been guiding me since day one when humanistic
research was still a foreign concept to me. Besides, I would like to express my most
sincere thanks to Ms. Ha Thanh for her thoughtful comments on my earlier drafts.

I would also love to express my gratitude for my family and friends without whom I
could have lost my motivation and patience in conducting this research. I am very
fortunate to have Hanh, Hai Anh, Duong, Ha Anh, and my older sister Linh Bip by my
side.
Last but not least, I wish to send my warmest thanks to five brave participants who
opened their heart with me about their experiences of being physically punished.

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Abstract
There is now a strong consensus in both the academic literature, legal framework, and
social attitude on the harms of corporal punishment in the home. Such a consensus
sometimes comes at the expense of nuances and candid discussion. This research project,
through the method of narrative inquiry, explores the life stories of five young
Vietnamese adults who experienced corporal punishment in their childhood and examines
how they make meanings of it as they grow up. It reveals the complicated, sometimes
paradoxical, meaning of corporal punishment as a practice embedded in the intimate
relationship between children and adults in their life: It swings between love and abuse,
fairness and irrationality, disciplined guidance and uncontained anger, trivial incidents
and formative events. The diversity in the participants’ stories suggests that the meanings
of corporal punishment are relational rather than absolute, and dependent on a network of
relations. Their narratives feature either continuities or discontinuities, which helps them
either maintain a connection to or distance themselves from their childhood experiences.
Their storytelling acts to reclaim the power they lacked in childhood and/or reflect the
(re)construction of their adult selves.
Key words: corporal punishment, narrative inquiry

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Acknowledgements
Abstract
Table of contents

i
ii
iii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the study
1.2 Statement of research problem and research questions
1.3 Theoretical perspective and Mode of inquiry
1.4 Significance of the study
1.5 Structure of the study

1
5
6
7
7

CHAPTER 2: BACKGROUND ISSUES
2.1 The discourses on corporal punishment
2.2 The narrative construction of the personal past and its implications
for adult development

8
14

CHAPTER 3: APPROACHING THE INQUIRY

19

CHAPTER 4: NARRATIVES OF CHILDHOOD CORPORAL PUNISHMENT
4.1 Zim’s narrative: Survival and the struggle for freedom
4.2 Anna’s story: Self-healing and reconstructing identity
4.3 Nhi’s narrative: Acts of rebellion
4.4 Bob’s narrative: On the making of a gentleman
4.5 Kougaku’s narrative: A story of masculine love

23
31
39
42
48

CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION

54

CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION

59

References

iii


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the study
More than 75% of parents in the world use corporal punishment at least regularly,
although they do not perceive this as the main technique of child discipline (Ember &
Ember, 2005; Levinson, 1989). As a country with a long history of Confucianism in its
pre-modern societies, Vietnam also witnessed corporal punishment as “the most accepted
form” of child discipline (Mestechkina, Son & Shin, 2021). To illustrate, 73.9 percent of
children aged 2 to 14 were reported to have experienced aggressive “discipline” at home
(including physical punishment and/or psychological aggression) (General Statistics
Office of Vietnam, 2011) while a small mixed methods study conducted in 2004 in Hanoi
discovered that parents still approved of the use of corporal punishment and stated that
their own childhood experience of corporal punishment justified the effectiveness of
corporal punishment (CSAGA, 2004). 
Notably, radical changes in public perceptions of corporal punishment has been
brought about thanks to the introduction of Western humanist values (i.e. democracy,
gender equality, and liberty) into the Vietnamese monarchic society (Nguyen, 2016); and
the revolutions in modernizing Vietnam pioneered by a group of Westernized Vietnamese
intellectuals and writers known as the Tự Lực Văn Đoàn (Self-Reliance Pen Club) in the
1930s. Certain traditional systems of thinking and behaviors were fiercely protested
against such as patriarchy and hierarchy, which brought about remarkable changes in
most social relationships, especially in the home. Meanwhile, the child was steered
towards more autonomy and liberty. Before these progressive movements, the child had a
lot of filial duties, which involved respecting his parents no matter what.

1

In support of these movements, in her book Giao duc Nhi dong (1942), Dam
Phuong Nu Su was on the frontier to criticize using corporal punishment as a childrearing
technique and propose alternative non-violent techniques. However, when the child
repeatedly conducted a serious mistake with full awareness and intention, Dam Phuong
Nu Su believed that child could be physically punished. She called corporal punishment
in this case “a bitter remedy” (Dam Phuong, 1942, p.19) that parents had to use as the last
resort. She also offered instructions on how parents should physically punish their child.
First, it was important that parents punish their child in a private space where no one
could make fun of the child or come to the rescue. During the punishment, parents should
only give their child several whippings in a calm and rational manner; and under no
circumstances should they verbally disparage their child. Instead, they had to explain why
corporal punishment was used and that they were heart-broken to give their child such “a
bitter remedy”. After the punishment, the child should be left on their own for a while
until he or she came back to their senses. At that point, parents could require their child to
be in a private space and ask whether the child acknowledged their wrongdoing. If the
child showed sincere remorse, parents should express affection for him or her.
Apparently, corporal punishment was perceived by Dam Phuong Nu Su to be detrimental;
yet, it could still be used from time to time to discipline the child as the last resort.
A robust body of previous literature has shown, through statistical means, that
corporal punishment is ineffective and even harmful (Douglas, 2006; Ripoll-Núñez &
Rohner, 2006; Lansford et al., 2014). The common findings suggest that corporal
punishment can be associated with negative outcomes in terms of the child’s
psychological, cognitive, and physical well-being (Burgess, 1979; Fergusson & Lynskey,
1997; Levendosky & Graham-Bermann, 2000; Durrant 2003, 2005, 2007; Gershoff 2002,
2008; Gershoff et al., 2010; Appleton & Stanley, 2011; Lansford et al., 2012; Durrant &
Ensom, 2012). To elaborate, a large-scale study conducted in Canada (MacMillan et al.,
1999) suggested a link between spanking in childhood and psychiatric disorders in
adulthood. Others found a variety of mental health issues associated with the use of
2

corporal punishment including depression, sadness, anxiety, feelings of despair, drug and
alcohol abuse, and general psychological maladjustment (Green, 1983; Giles-Sims et al.,
1995; Gonzalez et al., 2008); cognitive erosion and decrease on academic performance
(Larzelere 1996, 2000; Paolucci & Violato, 2004; Lazelere & Kuhn, 2005; Lansford et
al., 2005). However, other papers found few or no negative effects that corporal
punishment can exert on its receiver (Paolucci & Violato, 2004)t. Based on these studies’
inconsistent results, as well as conclusions from other researchers reflecting both
beneficial (Kobayashi-Winata & Power, 1989) and detrimental (Ferguson & Power,
1989) impacts of corporal punishment, apparently exact assumptions about the true
outcomes of physical punishment are circumscribed and pending.
The growing body of research associating physical punishment with detrimental
long-term effects has influenced public opinions of the practice in Vietnam, along with
the growth in developing models of positive discipline that are built upon nonviolent and
practical conflict resolution. However, the continued use of corporal punishment in the
name of love and guidance has caused it to be one of the most controversial parenting
techniques both globally and in Vietnam. This suggests more complexities than what
legalistic and scientific discourses generally assume.
.
In scientific studies, researchers attempt to theorize and explain the phenomena
concerning corporal punishment at a universal scale, which can be applied for any group
of studied subjects. However, this direction of researching about corporal punishment has
inadvertently produced simplistic discourses about the issues related to corporal
punishment by calling for an absolute understanding of corporal punishment and
excluding the various factors that can impact the way people perceive their experiences
of being physically punished. These factors can be the historical, cultural, relational or
the very personal characteristics of each person throughout their growing up. To bridge
this gap, this research uses narrative inquiry to examine the life stories of young adults
who have undergone physical punishment in their childhood years, and looks into how

3


they reconcile these experiences by making sense of past events as well as their adult
selves. By doing this, this paper contributes to the field of childhood studies that lacks the
voices of people who once experienced corporal punishment and positions the matter of
corporal punishment in a network of connections.

1.2 Statement of the Research Problem and Research Questions  
For young adults who were physically punished in their childhood, if their
experiences are merely viewed as an indispensable and normal part of growing up or
something corresponding to the conventional customs of living, their attitudes towards
corporal punishment and how they have come to reconcile or make sense of the conflicts
of intimacy will be made oversimplified, or worse, unheard. Thus, the experiences of
corporal punishment should not be viewed as an independent phenomenon from the
historical and cultural context where it happened and also as an event of the past, which
infers that what happened to someone at some point has nothing to do with who they are
now. Instead, corporal punishment and its discourse should be acknowledged as part of
the parent-child dynamics; and how each person perceives their experiences of being
corporally punished contributes to the nuances of their relationships with the parental
figures. The differentials of culture, family background, access to different resources such
as education or information of each person lead to these relationship nuances being
discursive rather than reduced to a generalization of meanings.
This study delves into the life stories of young people who have experienced
corporal punishment at some points in their journey of growing up and finds out the
meanings that they have made out of their experiences. Within the constraints of this
study, I set out to examine a few life stories in which the aim is not to draw out universal
meanings of corporal punishment, but rather personal, contextualized, and distinct
narrative in which each person made sense of their own experiences. The construction of

4


these narratives is an on-going project throughout each participant’s life; and thus, should
be viewed as an open-ended story rather than an end-product of a certain stage of life.

1.3 Theoretical perspective and Mode of Inquiry
This study’s theoretical perspective is post-structuralism, which, according to
Hutchinson and Wilson (1994, p. 302), “refuses appeals to epistemological absolutes and
embraces the wisdom of a multiplicity of positions acknowledging the contradictions
implicit in them and accommodating ambiguity”. Moreover, post-structuralism is in its
very nature to raise questions about the constitution of selves, and the spatial and
temporal changes in the relationship of power and knowledge in the context of different
political, social and cultural contexts.
From a post-structural perspective, the idea of discourse is a means to comprehend
what resources are available to individuals, which they employ to make sense of the
world and themselves in that world. In the meaning-making process of corporal
punishment, it is important to understand meaning as “not fixed, but as historically and
culturally specific” (Saussure, 1982). However, the meanings of some discourses of
corporal punishment tend to be more prevalent than others, and the same discourses can
be taken up differently by individuals. This can be explained by the relation between
power and discourse, which more or less follows the view of Foucault about discourse
and power. Some discourses have more power to exist than others because they are
reiterated by those who are more powerful than others. 
I believe the matter of corporal punishment is very intimate and personal, and
sometimes cannot be clarified from a quantitative or bound-by-law approach. This is
because the experiences of physical punishment touch on familial relationships, family
ties of filial piety and obligations, and views of self. With that being said, studying the
experiences of corporal punishment is “studying people, observing their lived

5


experiences, and trying to understand their life, and narratives come closer to
representing contexts and integrity of those lives than do questionnaires and graphs”
(Freeman, 1997, 1998a, p. 198). Thus, this study employs narrative inquiry as a mode of
inquiry, which aims to understand “how people cope with exceptional, difficult, and
transforming crises in their lives, how they invent new ways of speaking when old ways
fail them, how they make the absurd sensible and the disastrous manageable, and how
they turn calamities into gifts.” (Bochner, & Riggs, 2014, p. 196)

1.4 Significance of the study
In writing this paper, my aim is to seek out the detail-rich stories of young people
experiencing corporal punishment in their childhood with special attention to how they
reconstruct their identity and what kind of narrative techniques they use when retelling
their life stories. Each of these stories is placed in its own contexts and relationships, and
thus, revealing the complex meanings of corporal punishment that intervene in the
oftentimes oversimplified discourses of scientific research. More importantly, this paper
also contributes to the field of childhood studies through its use of adult narratives about
childhood experience and its focus on the Vietnamese context. Last but not least, this
study also helps me to reflect on my own lived experiences, wrap up what I am unable to
change in the past and move on with what I can change in the future.

1.5 Structure of the study
There are six chapters in this study. Chapter 1 offers an introduction to the
research problem followed by Chapter 2, which reviews major background issues.
Chapter 3 shows how the inquiry was conducted while Chapter 4 presents the collected
narratives of childhood corporal punishment. Chapter 5 discusses the matter of corporal
punishment in light of both theoretical and personal grounds before the limitations of the
study and implications for future research are suggested in Chapter 6.

6


CHAPTER 2: BACKGROUND ISSUES
2.1 The discourses on corporal punishment
Regarding legalistic discourse, the Vietnamese government has endeavored to
ensure children’s safety through legislative protections. To elaborate, Vietnam was among
the very first countries in the world to sign the United Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child in 1990, and the Government of Viet Nam has also issued many regulations
in protecting children from exploitation and harm. Among these regulations, The Child
Protection, Care and Education Law, passed in 1991 and revised in 2004, is the most
crucial legal document protecting children’s rights and demonstrating the obligations of
parents or caregivers. Specifically, Article 24, which clarifies the responsibility for
childcare and nurture, parents and caregivers are in charge of ensuring “a regime of
nutrition suitable to children's physical and mental development according to their age
groups”, “setting good examples for children in all aspects”; “building their respective
families into wealthy, equal, progressive and happy ones, thus creating a healthy
environment for comprehensive development of children” (Law on Child Protection,
Care and Education, No. 25/2004/QH11 of June 15, 2004). While more attention has
been drawn on the rights of children, there are no clear statements regulating the use of
physical punishment in the home, and the methods parents and caregivers can use to
discipline their children.  
With respect to scientific domain, the practice of corporal punishment has been
severely condemned by social scientists for the physical, emotional and cognitive harms
it can exert. Though some studies have shown that the effect of corporal punishment on
“the negative outcomes of externalizing, internalizing behaviors and low cognitive
performance” may be marginal (Ferguson, 2013, p.174), the consequences of corporal
punishment are tangible in many groups of people. For example, research conducted with
several groups of White, middle-class participants indicates negative developmental

7


outcomes associated with corporal punishment, which include “accidental injuries; lack
of self-esteem; physical changes to the developing brain and body as a result of trauma
and stress; mental health issues such as depression and anxiety; poor emotional and
physical development; smoking, drinking alcohol or drug use; disruption to education;
difficulties in forming and maintaining relationships” (Gershoff, & Bitensky, 2007,
pp.231-272). Besides, corporal punishment is also associated with an eroded quality of
parent-child relationship (Gershoff, 2002; Gershoff, 2010; Gershoff & Bitensky, 2007;
Mulvaney & Mebert, 2010; Renk et al., 2007). For instance, children report feeling
estranged from their parents after being physically punished. This is because children are
motivated to avoid painful experiences or agents, they will learn to avoid or distrust their
parents because they are the perpetrators of painful physical punishments (R.D., 1977).
Children who shun their parents will have a harder time developing sentiments of
intimacy with them, and without those feelings, they will be less susceptible to their
parents' good socializations (R.D., 1977). Another findings supporting the negative
impacts of corporal punishment is children’ aggression (Gershoff, 2010). In particular,
adults who remember experiencing more corporal punishment from their parents report
more verbal and physical aggressiveness with their spouses or dating partners. This is
because they learnt as children that they can compel others to do what they want by using
violence and force. This is supported by a number of studies that show that people who
were physically disciplined as children are more likely to commit violence against their
own family members as adults (Gershoff, 2010).
Concerning the effects found with Vietnamese participants, a study conducted on a
group of children aged 7 to 14 found that the participants suffer considerable physical,
emotional and academic consequences, yet they have limited resources to rely on when
dealing with it (CSAGA, 2014). On the contrary, there are studies that find few to no
negative impacts of corporal punishment. For example, the effects of corporal

punishment on the youth’s cognitive, affective, and behavioral growth were investigated
by Paolucci and Violato (2004). However, the researchers only included studies that
8


described corporal punishment (spanking) as a type of non-abusive or customary type of
punishment inflicted by a caregiver. Their findings indicate that this form of discipline
has only minor behavioral and affective consequences.
Corporal punishment can be associated with different meanings across cultures;
therefore, it is vital to place the discourse of corporal punishment in its specific social,
cultural, or historical contexts.
In Japan, corporal punishment (taibatsu) can mean “guidance” or “discipline”, but
it can also mean sitting in seiza, holding water buckets for a long time or even attending
moral lessons, which the students may not want to (Miller, 2010). This can be boiled
down to Japanese parents’ expectations to “realistically strengthen students, not shelter
them, in anticipation of the future tasks that students will face” (K. Letendre & Erwin
Fukuzawa, 2001, p. 93). Another context in which discipline manifests itself through
other types of punishment is the ritualization of particular behaviors. For instance,
cleaning or in other words, “forced” labor is implicated in ritualizing daily habits rather
than used as an explicit punishment. In this context, cleaning is perceived as a
“preventative maintenance” as it is to clean the “mind”, while corporal punishment is
often considered “a cure for bad behaviors” (Miller, 2010). In the context of sports,
corporal punishment was associated with strengthening the “fighting spirit, guts, and
willpower” of the players (Miller, 2010). However, the meanings of corporal punishment
can be complicated when it reflects nuances of child abuse. In particular, the term
“taibatsu” has been mainly used to depict a parent or a relative ‘abusing’ his or her
children at home in contemporary Japan (Miller, 2010).
On the contrary, the practice of corporal punishment carries embedded values of
religion and culture in the context of Jamaican families. In particular, there are diverse
meanings Jamaicans attribute to corporal punishment and the lived experiences of its use

in the Jamaican family. Advocates for corporal punishment expressed their thoughts on
9


the merits of the practice, citing biblical verses to back up their claims (Burke &
Sutherland, 2014). Such biblical verses go as: “He that spares his rod hates his son, but he
that loves him chasten him betimes – Proverbs 13:24; Withhold not correction from the
child but if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shall beat him with the
rod and deliver his soul from hell – Proverbs 23:13, 14. Besides, the use of corporal
punishment goes beyond the interest of children when it reflects parents’ protection of
cultural identity. For some Jamaican parents, they believed that they were entitled to
discipline their children in the way they saw fit. Any interference with this right, as well
as offers of other ways that they saw as indoctrinating and culturally imposed, were
rejected by advocates (Burke & Sutherland, 2014). Participants in a study conducted by
Burke & Sutherland (2014) expressed concerns about the country being pushed to accept
disciplining practices that are primarily imported from Western countries during the
discussion on corporal punishment. For some Jamaicans, the significance of their cultural
legacy is highlighted by this concern. Therefore, they resist abandoning corporal
punishment as a way to protect their cultural identity.
In the case of Vietnam, the discourse on corporal punishment as a child-rearing
technique is exuberant. For instance, the expression “Spare the rod, spoil the child” is a
universal advice when it comes to disciplining the child. To elaborate, this saying has
been “attributed to an advisor to the king of Assyria in the 7th century BCE and may
have been the source of Proverbs 13:24, “He that spareth the rod hateth his son: But he
that loveth him chasteneth him betimes” (Pinker, 2011, p. 450). The French also advised:
“Better to beat your child when small than to see him hanged when grown.” In the case of
Vietnam, the saying “Thương cho roi, cho vọt” has also been a prevalent child-rearing
belief for centuries (Cappa & Dam, 2013). Conventionally, children are expected to obey
their parents and if parents love their children they must hand their children the “whip of
love” (Segal, 2000; Emery, Nguyen & Kim, 2013). Before the twentieth century in

Vietnam, most of the discourses of corporal punishment can be found in poetry or state
laws. Due to influences of Confucianism, corporal punishment was associated with
10


“discipline” and “training”. For example, Đặng Huy Trứ wrote in his poem Cổ huấn nữ
ca:
“Nầy là trẻ khóc khơng khun,
Chưởi chưởi đánh đánh miệng liền với tay;
Nầy là tấc lưỡi lung lay,
Tay chơn xương thịt một ngày một xa”
“When the child cries, no advice arises
There go your hands whipping, your mouth yelling
And now his tongue is shaking
His limbs are getting faraway”
Or in Huấn nữ ca, a parenting advice goes as:
"Những lời tục tiểu nhớp nhơ
Nghe con nói đến roi quơ sửa liền".
(Nguyễn Trãi)
“Those dirty words you say
I use the whip to make it right.”
In Gia huấn ca written by Nguyễn Trãi in the fifteenth century, there is a parenting
advice that says:
                                  “Dạy từ thuở hãy còn trứng nước,
                                    Yêu cho đòn bắt chước lấy người,
                                    Trình thưa, vâng dạ, đứng ngồi,
                                    Gái trong kim chỉ, trai ngoài bút nghiên.”
                                                          (Nguyễn Trãi)
“Educate the child since its earliest days
11

Imitate the ancestors to whip the child for love
About their speaking manners, their postures
So girls master embroidery, boys win academia.”
The discourse on corporal punishment can also be found in a poem of Nguyễn
Đăng Tấn:
"Dẫu bây giờ bố mẹ - đôi khi
Có nặng nhẹ yêu thương và giận dỗi
Có roi vọt khi con hư và dối
Thương yêu con đâu đồng nghĩa với chiều."
“Even though we, parents, still
Get frustrated and upset sometimes
When you misbehave, there’s the whip of love
Love has no place for your indulgence.”
The discourse of corporal punishment can also be found intertwined within the
discourse of cultural concepts such as filial piety. This concept is oftentimes implicated in
the realm of authoritarianism, which is one of the core bases of Confucianism. To
establish and maintain this authoritarianism, filial piety was employed as the principal
instrument (Slote & De Vos, 1998). This instrument steered the child to be obedient and
respectful towards their parents, which can be illustrated by the adage “The fish without
salt must be rotten and a child who does not obey his parents must be a bad one”. If the
child resisted, he was considered to lack filial piety for “disobeying one's grandparents or
parents” (Le Code: Quoc Trieu Hinh Luat, art. 2). Another way to interpret the concept of
filial piety is that when children were being physically punished, they had to endure it
and not to run away. If they failed to withstand the punishment, they could be perceived
as weak or even unable to fulfill their filial duty (Cima, 1943). In contemporary Vietnam,
although corporal punishment is still employed as the last resort to discipline children, the
12

cultural meanings that are often associated with it such as filial piety, have been losing
their grounds.  
In addition, there is a blurring line between corporal punishment and child abuse.
Some researchers distinguish between what they refer to as “normal” physical
punishment, such as a painful slap on the backside of a child, and more extreme physical
punishment. Others contend that ‘natural’ physical discipline requires harsh reactions,
such as hitting children with implements (Gershoff, 2002b). Choosing a threshold of
when “reasonable” physical punishment stops and child abuse starts is complicated and
value-laden for those who do not consider mild physical punishment to be abusive, and
that explains why “the distinction between legitimate corporal punishment and child
abuse is, at best, blurry” (Freeman, 1994, p. 21). Thus, the limits where corporal
punishment is identified as a tool for disciplining the child are up to being challenged,
redefined and reinterpreted.

2.2 The narrative construction of the personal past and its implications
for adult identity
Remembering as socially constructed
Italian philosopher Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) provided one of the earliest
constructivist accounts of memory. Vico categorized memory into three different aspects:
memory as memory itself (memoria), memory as imagination (fantasia), and memory as
invention (ingegno). The first emphasizes memory’s power to recall items that are not
currently present, and therefore to materialize in the present what is considered part of the
past. Memory as memoria emphasizes the mind’s capacity to bring events from the past
into the present. Memory as fantasia, on the other hand, demonstrates how reconstruction
starts at the moment of perception. For Vico, objects cannot be grasped on their own but
are reordered in terms that are personal, and their recollection should represent this
primal reconstruction. As a result, memory is contingent on the malleable network of
13

meanings it is translated into. “Remembering an experience means re-understanding the
experience,” as Reiser, Black, and Kalamarides (1986) put it (p. 119). As a result, this
aspect of memory as innovation emphasizes that recall is partially dependent on
comprehension, and that developmental changes in comprehension will inevitably affect
autobiographical recollection (Fitzgerald, 1986; Fivush, 1988; Nelson, 1988).
As memories are multifaceted, fluid, and contextually bound (Conway &
Pleydell-Pearce, 2000), reconstruction of memories are thus highly elastic (Davies &
Harre, 1990). When this reconstruction is bound within a social context, such as in a
conversation, re-telling one’s autobiographical memories often involves a socially
constructed recollection of past events. To elaborate, when memories are retold in
conversations, they are oftentimes the joint product of both the speaker and the listener.
This coconstruction has an impact on both the events that are discussed and the
interpretive comments, facts, and emotions that are associated with the event. The
speaker’s enduring characteristics such as gender, cultural background, personality
directly influence how they recall past events. Besides, the reconstruction of past events
can also be influenced by their current self-views and beliefs. Albert (1977) suggested
that people are more likely to recall past events that are consonant with their current
self-views; thus, they can omit some part of memories when talking about an experience
and interpret selective events in ways consistent with their own beliefs. The speaker’s
goals in conversations with different listeners can also shape what and how past events
are recalled. For instance, people remember specific memories in private to help specific
self-views, control feelings, or achieve identity-related goals. In conversation, people can
remember specific experiences to create or sustain familiarity with their listeners, as well
as to present or construct a particular self-image in relation to that listener. To maintain a
positive view of their relationship, people can selectively recall events (Karney &
Coombs, 2000; Murray & Holmes, 1993, 1994). Finally, people may use their memories
of past events to help them choose priorities or solve problems (Pasupathi, Lucas, &
Coombs, 2001; Pillemer, 1998).
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With respect to listeners, the way they show discord with details, complete
speakers’ sentences, explicitly express boredom, disapproval or disinterest can also
influence the recollection of past events. Speakers’ expecting the presence of a listener or
how that listener behaves during a conversation can both influence speakers’
conversational remembering (Clark, 1996). It is intriguing that merely anticipating
speaking with others will affect the encoding of memories (Guerin & Innes, 1989;
Zajonc, 1960). People who plan to talk about their experiences with others can encode
them with more coherence, structure, and detail. Thus, before joining a conversation,
listeners already exert their influence. Besides, the inclusion of a past event in a
conversation can also be impacted by nonverbal behaviors of the listener (Krauss & Chiu,
1998). From the insignificance of incidents (Rime, 1995) to the past events’ being
distressing or socially unacceptable are both reasons for not talking about them (Wegner
& Lane, 1995) or the listener’s expected disinterest or disapproval can render in some
memories being excluded from the conversation. Thus, the coconstruction of the
speaker’s past extends implicitly to those events that are not mentioned or left unsaid.
Once an event is included in the talk, listeners provide a unique context for remembering
that is distinct from other contexts in which more opinions, appraisals, and summaries are
elicited. Notably, listeners’ personal characteristics also shape the kinds of stories that are
elicited. Take gender and expertise for examples. Both men and women show a
preference for women as recipients of disclosure, especially emotional disclosure, and
this preference is explicitly displayed in early adolescence (Pasupathi, Lucas & Coombs,
2001).

Narrative, identity, and narrative identity
The way people tell their stories is not linear, rather, it is an ongoing process as
they come to make sense of their stories (Brockmeier, 2002). Thus, doing research in
narrative identity means adopting a life-long developmental outlook on personality. This
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outlook embraces biological and cognitive changes, the needs of specific life stages, as
well as historical and generational influences as they all conspire to make any individual's
story a fluid and evolving work in progress. In constructing such a progressive narrative,
the roots of life-story making and telling play a vital role. These roots can be found back
in early childhood (Fivush, 1994), and projected forward to the final years of one’s life
(Kenyon, 1996). However, some researchers argue that adults’ attempts to recollect
childhood memories can be entangled with false memories (Ceci et al., 1994; Loftus and
Pickrell, 1995; Hyman and Pentland, 1996; Jones, 2003); or they can reconfigure real
memories to help them grapple with the remnants of an unhappy childhood. Confronting
this untrustworthiness of adults’ framing of childhood memories, and the unbridgeability
between the worlds of adult and child, Bachelard proposes that it is “the psychological
memory–imagination mixture” that matters rather than the accuracy of factual
information (Bachelard, 1969, p. 119). To elaborate, the history of facts, events, and
precision is “refracted through the lenses of imperfect memory and weakly constrained
imagination” (Philo, 2003). In sum, though adults are unable to reflect on childhood
through the lens of a child, adults can remember and interpret their memories of
childhood thanks to an admixture of recollections of past events and imagination.
People definitely own their past, but the contents of their autobiographical
memories can be influenced by other people or other contextual factors. When one tells
their stories of past experiences to oneself and others, these stories may be used for a
variety of purposes, including interpersonal bonding, moral lessons or amusement.
However, one of the most crucial tasks they perform is shaping one’s identity as the life
stories reveal something about himself to him and his listeners (Neisser, 1988). In other
words, individuals' narratives are founded on an existing repertory of cultural narratives
derived from myth, fable, literature, popular entertainment, and ethnic family history that
shape the meaning-making parameters of their life. Their personal narratives, or
‘‘narrative identities," anchor them in their culture, bringing their past, present, and
predicted future together. Each new chapter in the ongoing life story provides an

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opportunity for people to better understand where they fit in the world and what moves
them closer or further away from the goals they want. Therefore, the ways in which one
reconstruct their memories has the power to shape their own past and their identity
(Pasupathi, 2001).
Identity is a life story (McAdams, 1985, 2011), as identity takes the form of a story
with characters, scenes, setting, plot, and themes. People in modern societies begin to
recreate their personal pasts, interpret the present, and foresee the future in terms of an
internalized and expanding self-story, an integrative narrative of self that gives modern
life some unity and direction in late adolescence and young adulthood. Clearly, life
stories are built on autobiographical facts, but they go remarkably beyond factual
information as people selectively appropriate aspects of their experience and
imaginatively construe both past and future to create stories that make sense to them and
to their audiences, that animate and integrate life and make it more or less meaningful. In
these stories, certain episodes are selected to demonstrate a specific theme of one’s life
(Singer & Salovey, 1993) or are ruled out due to the rejection of the audiences (Linde,
1993). Thus, life stories grow over time, and becomes a core component of what defines
the person's individuality (McAdams, 2001). What is of more importance is how adults
use their life narrative to make sense of their own identity. Throughout adulthood, the
desire to rewrite one’s life story in light of new experiences and new audiences remains a
source of transition or stability. One can rewrite his life stories based on his own reactions
as well as the reactions of his audiences to enable improvement (McAdams, 1993) or be
stuck in his current identities (W. B. Swann, 1996). In conclusion, the life story is a facet
of identity that is specifically subject to coconstruction and continuity stresses, and it
directly provides the possibility of stability (keeping the same events, interpretations, and
themes) or transition (changing the events, interpretations, and themes).
As a result, talking about past experiences in conversation is a mechanism by
which we maintain or bring about change in our identities at multiple levels and through

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multiple pathways. Through this act, individuals gain a more secure and graceful footing
on

life's

road

as

they

advance from story-telling to meaning-making to

wisdom-accumulation. Learning and growing may entail accepting what has been lost or
will never be, yet this acceptance may allow for better long-term adjustment and more
prudent life choices, resulting in greater long-term satisfaction.

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