Introduction: Physical punishment against the child within the family and performed by her or his mother is a public health concern in Latin America. Objective: To determine the factors associated with physical mistreatment in children under five years of age performed by their mothers. Methods: We carried out an observational study based on the secondary analysis of the data from the 2017 National Survey of Health and Demography (ENDES, as it stands in Spanish for Encuesta Nacional de Salud y Demografía). The sample consisted of 13,565
