Number of siblings and intellectual development: The resource dilution explanation.
Abstract
The resource dilution model posits that parental resources are finite and that as the number of children in the family increases, the resources accrued by any one child necessarily decline. Siblings are competitors for parents' time, energy, and financial resources and so the fewer the better. Even one sibling is too many. The author describes the general elements of the dilution position and assesses its merits for explaining the effect of siblings on one component of the educational process--tests of intellectual development. The author identifies critical flaws in recent critiques of the dilution position and concludes that dilution continues to provide the most promising explanation for why children with few siblings score higher on tests of cognitive skills than children with many siblings.
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Children with more siblings tend to score worse on various intellectual measures.
“First, larger size of sibling group appears to adversely impact children’s perceptions of the quality of parenting received (Kidwell, 1981) and children with more siblings tend to fare worse on a variety of intellectual measures (Downey, 2001).”
From Sibling Separation and Placement Instability for Children in Foster Care (2022) · cites this paper as Downey, 2001
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- Authors
- Downey, D. B.
- Affiliations
- The Ohio State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Downey, Douglas B.
- ORCID
- Downey, Douglas B.
- Venue
- American Psychologist
- Published
- 2001
- Volume
- 56
- Issue
- 6-7
- Pages
- 497-504
- ISSN
- 0003-066X (ISSN-L)
- 1935-990X
- OpenAlex
- W4249444617
- Cited by
- 557
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 54 · 2025: 34 · 2024: 28 · 2023: 28 · 2022: 33 · 2021: 33 · 2020: 34 · 2019: 32 · 2018: 17 · 2017: 25 · 2016: 38 · 2015: 27 · 2014: 23 · 2013: 27 · 2012: 20
- FWCI
- 7.48
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- American Psychologist (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Social Sciences › Demography › Family Dynamics and Relationships
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Intergenerational and Educational Inequality Studies
- Keywords
- number of siblings, intellectual development, resource dilution, family size, cognitive development, parental resources
- MeSH terms
- Achievement, Child, Child Development, Family Characteristics, Humans, Intelligence, Models, Psychological, Socioeconomic Factors, Causality
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