COLUMBUS, Ohio, July 21 (UPI) -- Ohio State University sociologists say children who grow up with siblings get along better with classmates in kindergarten than do children without siblings.
In their national study of more than 20,000 children, teachers rated students who had at least one sibling as better able to form and maintain friendships.
Those children also got along with people who are different, comforted and helped other children, expressed feelings in a positive way, and showed sensitivity to the feelings of others.
"Children without siblings were consistently rated as having poorer social skills," said Douglas Downey, co-author of the study. "Siblings fight with each other, they have conflicts, but they also figure out how to resolve those conflicts. That probably helps them deal with other children when they go to school."
Most previous research had shown no social-skills advantage to having brothers and sisters.
"This is one case where what seems like common sense was not supported by the previous research," Downey said. "But we think our study has several advantages over what was done previously."
