Congruence between Sibling Relationship and Parenting Practices across Older and Younger Siblings

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate whether maternal control and discipline practices relate to perceived siblingrelationship quality with the mediating role of perceived maternal warmth and hostility across younger and oldersiblings, and whether the pattern of relations differs across siblings. As previous studies examining the link betweenparenting and child-related outcomes generally recruited only one child in a family, we recruited two siblingsgrowing in the same family to examine child-specific influences. A total of 100 Turkish families with older (5.3 - 8.7years) and younger siblings (3 - 5.5 years) participated in the study. Mothers reported their discipline practices,observers rated mothers' control practices, and siblings reported maternal warmth and hostility, and sibling positiveaffect and conflict. Results revealed that, for both siblings, higher maternal positive control was related to higherperceived maternal warmth, in turn, associated with higher perceived sibling positive affect, and higher maternalnegative discipline was linked with higher perceived maternal hostility, in turn, related to higher perceived siblingconflict. Moreover, younger siblings whose mothers used higher positive control perceived their mothers as beingless hostile yet there was no such association for older siblings. Overall, findings suggested that there is a congruencebetween parent-child relationship and sibling relationship quality across older and younger siblings.