Research suggests sibling bullying can be just as detrimental to the psyche as bullies at school, according to the New York Times.
Experts studied 3,600 children and adolescents using data from the National Survey of Children's Exposure to Violence, and found that those who were attacked, threatened or intimidated by a sibling had increased levels of depression, anger and anxiety.
Dr. Corinna Jenkins Tucker, the lead author of the study published in the journal Pediatrics, said behaviors among siblings that cross the line into abuse deserve more recognition.
"Historically, the general thinking has been that it's not a big deal, and sometimes it's even viewed as being a good thing," Tucker, an associate professor of family studies at the University of New Hampshire, told the Times. "There appears to be different norms of acceptability. Peer aggression is unacceptable, but it's not the same for siblings."
Tucker said anti-bullying programs in schools and other settings should include a focus on sibling relationships as well.
"The aggression among siblings should be taken just as seriously as that among peers," she said.
The study suggest sibling rivalries are normal and they encourage healthy competition, but becomes damaging when one child is consistently the victim of another intending to cause harm and humiliation. Parent who show favoritism to one child can also increase sibling bullying.
According to reports, sibling violence is the most common form of family violence. Nearly half of all children in the study have been punched, kicked or bitten by a sibling, and roughly 15 percent have been repeatedly attacked.
Families tend to view the attacks as horseplay and do not intervene as strictly as researchers suggest parents to when their children are constantly fighting.
"Our society tends to minimize child-on-child violence in general," Dr. John V. Caffaro, a clinical psychologist and the author of "Sibling Abuse Trauma," told the Times. "We have these ideas that if you're hurt by a child it's less injurious than if you're hurt by an adult, but the data don't support that."
Catherine Bradshaw, an expert on bullying and the deputy director of the Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence at Johns Hopkins University, told the Times that the large scale study showed all types of sibling aggression are associated with worse mental health.
"Parents at times might be thinking that their kids can fight it out or that a little bit of victimization might not be so bad," Bradshaw said. "But these findings suggest that the threshold is pretty low. It's not just the rough stuff you have to keep an eye out for."
