The quality of sibling relationships and the development of social competence and behavioral control in aggressive children.

Abstract

To understand the relations between sibling interactions and the social adjustment of children with behavior problems, 53 aggressive 1st- and 2nd-grade children, their mothers, and their siblings were interviewed about positive and negative aspects of the sibling relationship. When conflict and warmth were considered together, 3 types of sibling dyads emerged: conflictual (high levels of conflict, low levels of warmth), involved (moderate levels of conflict and warmth), and supportive (low levels of conflict, high levels of warmth). On most measures of social adjustment at school, children in involved sibling relationships showed better adjustment than did children in conflictual relationships. Results are discussed in terms of a developmental model for at-risk children in which some sibling relationships may foster the development of social skills in addition to providing emotional support, which may enhance adjustment at school. Models describing the development of aggressive behavior problems typically emphasize the role of parental practices and parent-child interactions in the elicitation and maintenance of high rates of problematic behavior (see Patterson, 1982). Patterson and his colleagues (Patterson, 1980, 1986) have also explored the possibility that siblings may play a key role in the family cycles of coercive exchanges that foster aggression. In families of aggressive children, coercive exchanges between siblings occur frequently and intensely and may serve to train each sibling to react aggressively in an escalating cycle of attacks and counterattacks. In an extension of Patterson's work, Loeber and Tengs (1986) found that, compared with normal children, aggressive children initiated more coercive chains with their sib

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