I don't know if he associates smacking, hairwashing etc., with extra attention. It's possible.
He certainly wants attention at mealtimes, as he has begun telling long rambling nonsense tales if DH and I get into an adult conversation. His language skills are excellent and as people tend to comment on it in front of him (which I hate), I think he tends to show off about that.
He is still an only child, and as he is being brought up bilingually, with my language the minority one, I tend to listen to him and talk to him a lot, more than other parents maybe. He was a very needy baby (gastric reflux) and toddler and has only recently learnt to spend more time playing or 'reading' on his own. I feel (and others have also said), that I spend a lot of time with him, pay him a lot of attention, listen to what he has to say, and always explain things carefully to him, while trying to impose clear boundaries on what is and isn't acceptable. Maybe he's just testing those boundaries.
I think he's going through a bit of a scared phase. He often talks about whether he's a big boy or a little boy, and about what he can and can't do, as if his growing independence worried him while making him feel proud. He's waking at night again, after months of sleeping through.
DH wants to record DS yelling "Mummy, smack my bottom, j'en ai envie" for posterity (humiliation in the future, more like!), as he finds it hysterical, but I can't laugh about it right now.
My Eye, I didn't say anything to the visitors, which I now regret. The mother is an old friend, whom I now see for only brief periods and very rarely. She's been through a really rough time since the birth, is quite depressed and a bit lost and I chickened out of criticising her parenting methods.
Sorry, a bit of a ramble...