21 January 2024 , 07:00
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For some parents, the thought of big happy family with lots of children running around is an appealing image.
Brothers and sisters can look out for each other as they grow up and a touch of sibling rivalry and squabbling is all just par for the course. However, a recent study found that having a large amount of siblings could being doing more harm than good to teenagers.
The research, carried out by Doug Downey, a professor of sociology at Ohio State University, looked specifically at secondary schoolchildren in the US and China. He discovered that teens from larger families suffered more from mental health problems than those from smaller families.
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The study included 9,400 eighth graders from the China Education Panel Study and more than 9,100 American eighth graders from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, all with an average age of 14. The results, published in the Journal of Family Issues, found that only a third Chinese children are single children with no siblings, with just 12.6% in the US.
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A number of questions related to mental health were put to each of the children and overall it was shown that the more siblings a teen has then the more that mental health issues are likely to occur. In China, teenagers with no siblings appeared to have the best mental health. While in the US, those with no or one sibling had similar levels of mental health. Older siblings and siblings close in age showed the worst levels of mental health.
Downey said the overall findings fits with the "resource dilution" explanation. He added: "If you think of parental resources like a pie, one child means that they get all the pie - all the attention and resources of the parents. But when you add more siblings, each child gets fewer resources and attention from the parents, and that may have an impact on their mental health."
He conceded, though, that the data used didn't take into account the quality of sibling relationships. It is also possible that strong-bonded relationships of this kind could in fact improve a teen's mental health.
Other research has also found that having more siblings is linked with better social skills among kindergarteners and a lower change of divorce among adults. Downey said: "This combination of results is not easily explained. We still have more to learn about the impact of siblings.
"This is particularly important now as the US and other countries have lower fertility rates. Understanding the consequences of growing up with fewer or no brothers and sisters is an increasingly important social issue."
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