OPEN ACCESS
PEER-REVIEWED
Comparative Study
| Published: August 23, 2020
Sibling rivalry: an under-rated entity of the little minds? A descriptive study
Department of Paediatrics, Providence hospital, Alappuzha, Kerala, India Google Scholar More about the auther
Department of General Medicine, Mysore medical college, Karnataka, India Google Scholar More about the auther
DIP: 18.01.069/20200803
DOI: 10.25215/0803.069
ABSTRACT
Objectives: To identify the etiological profile and risk factors of children with sibling rivalry and to identify presentation and manifestation of sibling rivalry in a child. Methods: In this descriptive study, 84 children who presented to the paediatric outpatient department (OPD) and child psychiatry OPD over a period of one year with behavioural changes after birth of their siblings were enrolled in the study. Parents were asked to fill the questionnaire during history elicitation. Percentages and median interquartile range were calculated and SPSS 23.0 software was used for analysis. Results: Median age of presentation was 5 years. Male children, children from above poverty line families, children from nuclear families, first born children, nursery and pre-school children were the most affected. Bullying was the commonest symptom of presentation followed by fear of losing parental love. Depression was the least common presentation. Majority of parents were unaware of the entity- sibling rivalry. Conclusions: Sibling rivalry is an under-rated entity in child psychology. It can lead to a wide range of psychological manifestations ranging from anger outbursts to physical insults over the sibling. Hence, the older child should be given better care and attention after the birth of the next order child to prevent mental trauma to the child. Prospective parents should be given better awareness and counselling about this condition for better mental health outcome in the children.
This is an Open Access Research distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any Medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
© 2020, J Suresh & Nidheesh C R
Received: July 08, 2020; Revision Received: August 20, 2020; Accepted: August 23, 2020
Article Overview
ISSN 2348-5396
ISSN 2349-3429
18.01.069/20200803
10.25215/0803.069
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Published in Volume 08, Issue 3, July-September, 2020