Thus brothers and sisters help develop empathy

Children who have siblings are kind, warm and supportive and grow up to be more empathetic than their only children.

Don't store avocado like this: it's dangerous

Children who have siblings are kind, warm and supportive and grow up becoming more empathetic than their only children according to this study

Brothers, one big and one smaller, and a highly developed empathy. Having a brother or sister could make us kinder and more empathetic, and while it is known that at some point in life we ​​get down on each other at the slightest opportunity, growing up with a brother or sister can actually play an important role in development of a child.

This is what emerges from a new joint research from the University of Calgary, the Canadian University of Laval, the University of Tel Aviv and that of Toronto, according to which children who have siblings are kind, warm and supportive and grow to be more empathic with respect to only children.

Likewise, older siblings play an important role in the lives of minors and, together with their parents, serve as role models, helping the younger ones to learn about the world.

But "our findings underscore the importance of considering how all family members, not just parents, contribute to children's development," suggests Sheri Madigan, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Calgary and co-author of the study. .

A systematic review

To arrive at these conclusions, the researchers considered a group of 452 pairs of children aged 18 months to four years including all combinations:

• older brother and younger brother
• older brother and younger sister
• older sister and younger brother
• older sister and younger sister

The goal was to find out if the siblings 'level of empathy at the start of the study could predict changes in other siblings' empathy. For this the researchers filmed the interactions in the homes of the families and the mothers completed the questionnaires to note the responses of their older children to situations that required some empathic involvement, such as reacting in front of a parent who simulated a physical pain or a sad adult.

At the end of the observation period, the older brothers and sisters, who had begun to relate to the youngest of the family, were decidedly more empathic compared to the start of the experiment.

Furthermore,

"The effects are the same for all of the children in the study with one exception: the younger siblings do not contribute to significant changes in the empathy of the older sisters," said Marc Jambon of Toronto University.

Finally, the influence of older brothers and sisters was stronger in families where the age difference between the children was greater, confirming the role that the big brothers assume, that of "teachers" and models.

Follow us on Telegram | Instagram | Facebook | TikTok | Youtube

Read also:

• The first children are smarter than the second. Word of the scientists
• Becoming Uncles: The best gift siblings can give us is a nephew
• Brothers and Sisters: How Birth Order Can Affect Our Destiny

• 10 extraordinary characteristics of highly sensitive people