Parental Guidance aims to “shine a light on parenting in Australia and start a conversation about parenting”.

And if we are going off Monday night's episode alone, the show has certainly achieved this.

There was quite an emotional debate over a particularly controversial parenting choice.

Case in point: is it ever okay to smack your child?

“A smack quickly communicates there are boundaries, there are consequences, [and] you can’t just do whatever you want,” one parent said last night on the show.

And the reactions and discomfort from the panel of parents were visceral.

Watch: is it okay to smack your kids? Post continues below.

As the debate rages on, let’s take a look at the conversation that took place and the potential impacts smacking can have on a person long term.

What isParental Guidance?

Parental Guidancefollows 10 sets of parents with 10 vastly different parenting styles. Throughout the series, the parents will go up against each other to compete in various ‘extreme parenting’ challenges.

Some of the parenting styles include strict, French-Nuevo, routine, nature, attachment and free-range.

My husband: “what’s our parenting style?” Me: “Coping. Barely.” #parentalguidance

— Stephanie Pham (@steph_aniepham)

Given the contestants’ vastly different parenting styles and opinions, the series is expected to drum up a lot of debate, the show hosted by Dr. Justin Coulson and Todayshow host Ally Langdon.

Parental Guidanceand the conversation about smacking.

Monday's premiere episode ofParental Guidance started with quite the heated debate: is it okay to smack your child?

The resounding response from both co-host Dr. Coulson and the parents on the show: absolutely not.

According to Dr. Coulson, who is the founder of Happy Families and author of six books on raising children, our opinions on smacking are outdated.

“Around 50 per cent of Australians still think smacking is okay. And really this is something that needs to change,” he said.

Now onto last night’s episode.

The self-titled ‘Strict Parents’ are Andrew and Miriam who are all about boundaries and rules when it comes to parenting their three children.

“Smacking is one of the tools in the parenting toolbox. It is by no means the first tool. But a smack quickly communicates that what they’ve done is not okay,” Andrew and Miriam say.

And judging by the looks on the other parents’ faces, Andrew and Miriam quickly realise they are in the minority in their view.

“For me in this day and age: you smack a child? You’re violating someone’s body,” one of the other parents says.

“If you hit your wife or your husband, or an animal, that is abuse. What’s the difference?” another one whispers to their partner.

To see their parenting style at play, the co-hosts set up an experiment: opposite day. Namely, let’s have the kids be the adults for the afternoon and vice versa.

Now for Andrew and Miriam, it’s a pretty confronting challenge.

We immediately see the kids go for the wooden spoon and begin hitting their parents on the bottom repetitively.

The role reversal makes Andrew and Miriam quite emotional, as their kids immediately saw the opportunity to become ‘adults’ as a means to exercise physical control.

“We all love our kids heaps. You don’t want to do anything as a parent that will give baggage to your kids. So, we’re doing our best,” Andrew says while becoming quite upset.

Imagine telling your kid to act like a parent, and the first thing they get excited to do is hit you with a wooden spoon… far out 😳 #parentalguidance

— my name is whatever you decide (@lgbettyswift)

Going back to the initial reaction from the other parents when Andrew and Miriam revealed they smack their children under certain circumstances, co-host Langdon then asks the room, “Let’s have some honesty: raise your hand if you have you ever smacked your child.”

And essentially half the room puts their hand up.

So, what are the impacts associated with smacking a child?

American researchers Elizabeth Gershoff and Andrew Grogan-Kaylor in 2016 found children who are physically punished are just as “likely to defy their parents when they spank as comply with them”.

So, in actual fact, smacking doesn’t really do a whole lot in terms of discipline.

And the lack of disciplinary success also comes with a much greater concern: the long-term social and psychological impacts.

One concern according to leading experts is what smacking teaches children about using physical force.