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Companionship Patterns and Emotional States During Social Interactions for Adolescents With and Without Siblings

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Abstract

For decades, researchers and the general public have debated whether children without siblings differ from children with siblings in ways that are meaningful for development. One area that is underexplored in the literature on only children versus children with siblings concerns time use and emotional states in alone time and in social interactions. Resource dilution theory and the prior literature suggests that adolescent only children and adolescents with siblings may differ in some social interactions, such as in time with parents, but not in others, such as in time alone, due to offsetting effects or the universality of certain experiences among adolescents. This study tested these arguments by comparing companionship patterns and four emotional states (happiness, sadness, stress, and meaningfulness) among adolescents (ages 15–18) without siblings (N= 465) and adolescents with siblings (N= 2513) in the nationally representative American Time Use Survey (2003–2017). Relative to adolescents with siblings, adolescents without siblings spent more time alone, similar amounts of time with peers, and more time exclusively with parents. Only children were not as happy when spending time alone and with peers as adolescents with siblings, but their emotions in these settings were not more negative or less meaningful. In most other social interactions, emotional states were similar between adolescents with and without siblings. These findings show that adolescents with and without siblings differed mainly in their companionship patterns within the household and in their levels of happiness when alone and with peers.

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Acknowledgements

We gratefully acknowledge helpful comments from Kelly Raley and members of the Family Demography working group at the Population Research Center at UT-Austin, Regina Bures, Sarah Flood, Sandra Hofferth, Kathleen Zick, participants at the Population Association of America 2019 annual meeting, and participants at the International Time Use Research Association 2019 annual meeting.

Authors’ Contributions

JSW participated in the study design and coordination, conducted analysis and participated in drafting the manuscript; EA conceived of the study, participated in its design and participated in drafting the manuscript; ACJ participated in the study design and in drafting the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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The manuscripts data will not be deposited. Original data are available online through IPUMS (https://ipums.org)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, Brigham Young University, 435 CTB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA

    Jocelyn S. Wikle

  2. Department of Geography, University of California, 1832 Ellison Hall, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106-4060, USA

    Elizabeth Ackert

  3. School of Family Life, Brigham Young University, 2086 JFSB, Provo, UT, 84602, USA

    Alexander C. Jensen

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  1. Jocelyn S. Wikle
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Correspondence to Jocelyn S. Wikle.

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Wikle, J.S., Ackert, E. & Jensen, A.C. Companionship Patterns and Emotional States During Social Interactions for Adolescents With and Without Siblings. J Youth Adolescence 48, 2190–2206 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-019-01121-z

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