New research out of Brigham Young University has found something that runs counter to what they likely would have preferred to find. The study authors from this Mormon school — home of the Flourishing Families Project — did not find that parental influence “protects” children from mental illness. Instead, as the title to the news release tells it . . .
Siblings. Not parents. Well, at least the variable is family-related. Or is it? The lead sentence is appropriately tentative. See if you can spot the very important term -
Something about having a sister – even a little sister – makes 10- to 14-year-olds a bit less likely to feel down in the dumps.
Yes, “something about having a sister” (more dolls? more time in social play? etc.). Why the essential tentativeness? Due to the nature of the data, as described here -
Padilla-Walker’s research stems from BYU’s Flourishing Families Project and will appear in the August issue of the Journal of Family Psychology. The study included 395 families with more than one child, at least one of whom was an adolescent between 10 and 14 years old. The researchers gathered a wealth of information about each family’s dynamic, then followed up one year later. Statistical analyses showed that having a sister protected adolescents from feeling lonely, unloved, guilty, self-conscious and fearful. It didn’t matter whether the sister was younger or older, or how far apart the siblings were agewise.
Brothers mattered, too. The study found that having a loving sibling of either gender promoted good deeds, such as helping a neighbor or watching out for other kids at school. In fact, loving siblings fostered charitable attitudes more than loving parents did. The relationship between sibling affection and good deeds was twice as strong as that between parenting and good deeds. [bold and italics added]
With statistical analyses, and whole host of variables involved, you have to make conclusions cautiously. As for the terms “protected” and “promoted” . . . mmmm, I wonder. For the variables of sibling and mental health were statistically associated. This was no controlled experiment.
Also notice that “Brothers mattered, too.” But they didn’t matter in terms of the variables listed in the previous paragraph. They mattered in terms of yet other semi-scatter-shot variables.
While I think it is wise to be skeptical of this finding — not to outright reject it, but to ask questions, await further findings, and to refrain from prematurely and whole-heartedly accepting it.
Why, I wonder, was the relative lack of parental influence not the highlighted finding? I would bet my bottom dollar that the study authors looked for it. But it wasn’t there. Is that not important news? Of course it is. But null results too often get swept under the rug. Ignored.
As for parental influence in general, many studies and lines of research over the past couple decades or so have strongly suggested that it is much less than supposed and perhaps desired. Instead, much of the personality and behavior of children can be chalked up to genetic and peer influence. Among other things.
Sure, parents can and do influence their children. But not as potently as assumed in previous generations. Nor as potently as preached by politicians, talk-show hosts, and clergy who wish it were simplistic so.
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Tags: culture, mental health, parenting
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