Researchers from Michigan State University in the US have found nearly as many as one in four parents or caregivers slap their children in public. Or, to use the academic term, the children are at the receiving end of what their study calls "negative touch" – anything from arm-pulling to pinching. Lead researcher Dr Kathy Stansbury wrote: "I was very surprised to see what many people consider a socially undesirable behaviour done by nearly a quarter of the caregivers."

The first part of Stansbury's statement made me pause. Is smacking really a "socially undesirable behaviour"? I was reminded of psychologist Jonathan Haidt's argument that there is a liberal bias in academics, especially in the social sciences. So I asked the question on social media. All but one respondent replied with a "yes, it's undesirable", with some stretching to "undesirable and (it should be) criminal". Hmm. Perhaps I was the one out of touch here.

I was also surprised at the percentage of caregivers who operated with a "negative touch" policy – I'd have expected it to be considerably higher. Full disclosure: I was smacked as a child. At home, I had taps on the backs of my legs, rulers on the flat of my hands and – a couple of memorable times – the tongue of a belt on the palm.

This form of discipline had pretty much ceased by the time I was about 10, but then I went to secondary school. Corporal punishment was normal and sanctioned by the school system (as it had been in most Nigerian primary schools), and I felt the sting of more than a few canes across my backside over the years. I can barely remember the "crimes" committed, or the actual caning encounters, but at the time I must have cried like a baby and raged like a movie super villain.

There's a Yoruba saying: "Aya omode ni were di si, egba la o fi tu", which roughly translates as "the madness which resides in the chest of a child can be undone with a cane". Interestingly, the Michigan State study found that "kids disciplined with positive touch were more likely to comply more often and more quickly with less fussing".

As an adult, I have made a conscious decision that if and when I have children, I will not smack them. My decision does not stem from a deep well of emotional trauma: I do not consider myself to have been abused. I think that is due to the environment I was in: the context was that almost everyone I knew was smacked. It was, for want of a better word, "normal". But for all of my positive (an odd word, I know) experience of this form of punishment, I just reckon that smacking is not the variable that guarantees "good" children.

I, along with a bunch of friends, was smacked and we turned out undamaged. But then, a lot of my friends and peers weren't smacked and they're responsible, undamaged adults too. Of course, it works the other way too, which suggests to me that smacking is not the deciding factor here.

The language we use when we talk about smacking children is interesting. There is obviously a clear line between "smacking" and "abuse" but both are often used interchangeably in the course of this debate. There are children who have been brutalised by their caregivers under the umbrella term of "smacking" and "discipline". This was not my experience, and I doubt it is for the millions of children who are smacked. Parenting is a personal thing, often done publicly. And it's worth remembering that the social stigma of smacking does not seem to be stopping a determined set of parents from "disciplining" their children this way.

The law as it stands has a "reasonable chastisement" clause, which permits mild smacking. And that's how it should stay – parents need some autonomy in deciding on how to raise their own children.