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(HealthNewsDigest.com) – JERUSALEM, — A study published today in Child Development, led by Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HU) developmental psychology expert Professor Ariel Knafo-Noam and Dr. Anat Perry, examines how growing up as a sibling of a child with disabilities may nurture empathy. This is one of the first studies to examine the possible positive effects of growing up with a sibling with a disability.
Having a child with a disability or a developmental delay is often a stressful experience for a family. Siblings in such families may be exposed to greater stress and challenges. Until now, there has been little research about the positive effects of growing up with a sibling with disabilities.
“Our findings indicate that siblings of children with disabilities may have greater cognitive empathy—that is, an understanding of others’ thoughts and feelings–which is important as cognitive empathy is key for social skills,” says Yonat Rum, a postdoctoral researcher at Hebrew University and the University of Cambridge.
Researchers examined data from the Longitudinal Israeli Study of Twins which included 1,657 families of twins born in 2004-2005. Of these, 63 families were identified where one of the twins has a disability and the other is typically developing.
The typically developing twin siblings of children with disabilities were then compared to 404 typically developing twin siblings, on measures of cognitive and emotional empathy and pro-sociality, completed when all children were 11 years old from the rest of the sample.
Participating children were administered a self-report questionnaire to assess their cognitive and emotional empathy, and a computerized task designed to assess prosocial behavior. Further, the participating children’s parents completed a questionnaire to assess their children’s pro-social behaviors.
The data showed that typically developing children who had a twin with disabilities scored higher in self-reported cognitive empathy than did typically developing children who did not have a special-needs twin. Contrary to predictions, no differences were found in emotional empathy and pro-sociality.
“These positive effects might be due to the specific ‘advantage’ of cognitive empathy to better understand their sibling with disabilities and to support the sibling relationship,” explained Ariel Knafo-Noam. The authors acknowledged the preliminary nature of the findings and called for further research in this neglected field.
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CITATION: Child Development, Are There Positive Effects of Having a Sibling with Special Needs? Empathy and Prosociality of Twins of Children with Non-Typical Development by Rum, Y. Genzer, S., Markovitch, N., Perry, A., and Knafo-Noam, A and Jenkins, J.10.1111/cdev.13740
FUNDING: Israel Science Foundation, Halbert Centre for Canadian Studies.
About American Friends of the Hebrew University
American Friends of the Hebrew University (AFHU) is a national, not-for-profit organization based in the United States. AFHU is headquartered in New York, and has seven regional offices working in close partnership with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. AFHU provides supporters, Hebrew University alumni, and the public with stimulating programs and events, and organizes missions to Israel. The organization’s activities support scholarly and scientific achievement at HU, create scholarships, fund new facilities, and assist the University’s efforts to recruit outstanding new faculty.