Siblings Are No Good? Study Finds Kids From Smaller Families are Better Off

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As the saying goes, "the more, the merrier," but for families, science disproves this theory. In fact, Yahoo! Parenting reports that a new study coming from three economists reveals how larger families may cause behavioral issues and cognitive troubles among older children, implying that kids from smaller families may actually be better off.

The Washington Post reports that Chinhui Juhn, Yona Rubinstein, and C. Andrew Zuppann studied data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth in 1979, which asked families questions about their children's math and reading abilities, behavioral issues, and home environments. The researchers then analyzed the performance of older siblings before and after a younger sibling was added to the family. Results showed that the measure of parental investment in older children, such as how often the families ate meals together or how often parents showed affection, dropped by 3% after a younger child is born. Meanwhile, cognitive scores also dropped by 2.8% points, while behavioral problems increased.

The researchers also found gender differences in the effects of whether a family adds a baby to the family. Among girls who had younger siblings, they were more likely to experience a dip in reading and math scores, while boys were more likely to have behavioral issues. Overall, the addition of another child also meant a decreased amount of education for each child. Researchers discovered that for every child born in the family, the average amount of education the kids in the family received dropped by 13 years.

Business Insider reports that according to the study, "Using a variety of approaches we have documented a significant trade-off between quantity and quality of children for NLSY mothers and their children. Using a variety of approaches we have documented a significant trade-off between quantity and quality of children for NLSY mothers and their children."

The researchers claim that "Our fixed effect estimates indicate that the arrival of a younger sibling reduces measures of parental investment as well as cognitive and non-cognitive outcomes of older children by approximately one-tenth of a standard deviation."

FOX News reports that researchers also noted, the mother's intelligence, which was measured via the Armed Forces Qualification Test, were also factors in the outcomes of the children.

"High AFQT mothers of all races appear to face less of a trade-off than mothers with low AFQT scores," the study read. "Differences in mother's AFQT scores are correlated with a wide set of lifestyle differences that could explain these differences. For instance, having worse child care coverage, maternity policies, or flexibility in household labor supply could all make the presence of an additional child more detrimental to other children in the household."