Research On The Relationship Between Sibling Structure And Adolescent Mental Health

From the strict "one child" policy at the beginning,to the "one-and-a-half policy",the "two-child policy for couples both of whom are from a one-child family",the "two-child policy for couples either of whom is from a one-child family",and then to the implementation of the full two-child policy,the birth policy has been gradually relaxed.The relaxation of the birth control policy has led to the emergence of more and more non-one-child families,with more children growing up with their biological siblings.Family is an important place for individual socialization,which has an important influence on the development of an individual’s life.The family structure changes brought about by the relaxation of the birth policy will inevitably have an impact on the wellbeing and development of individuals.The Resource Dilution Theory is a key theoretical framework to understand the influence of siblings on individual development.According to this theory,family resources are limited,and the increase of the number of children in a family will"dilute" the resources available to each child,thus detrimental to the development of children.Media reports in recent years have shown that an increase in the number of children in a family under the relaxed birth policy may cause negative emotions and psychological problems among children.Mental health during adolescence is related to the future development of individuals,and thus bears larger implications for development of the country and society.It is of great significance to pay attention to the development of adolescent mental health and explore whether and how the adjustment of fertility policy may affect adolescent mental health.This study used the China Education Panel Survey(CEPS)data from 2013-2014 academic year,through Contingency table analysis,Ologit regression analysis and OLS regression analysis,based on the Resource Dilution Theory perspective,discussed under the background of birth policy to relax,siblings structure impact on development of adolescent mental health and the influence of the specific mechanism.This study first explored whether having siblings have a negative effect on adolescent mental health,and then further explored whether siblings have a gender difference in resource dilution effect on adolescent mental health under the gender culture in China.This study has concluded the following four findings.First,having siblings has a negative impact on adolescent mental health:the mental health of only children is better than that of non-only children;as the number of siblings increases,the mental health of adolescents decreases.Second,having siblings has a negative impact on adolescents’ access to family psychological resources:only children have more family psychological resources than non-only children;the more siblings adolescents have,the fewer psychological resources they would have in their families.Thirdly,family psychological resources play a complete or partial mediating role between siblings and adolescent mental health.Siblings influence the access of adolescent family psychological resources,and then influence the level of adolescent mental health.Fourthly,there are gender differences in the dilution effect of siblings on family psychological resources.In the allocation of total family psychological resources,female adolescents are more dominant than male adolescents.However,the influence of siblings on the access of family psychological resources of female adolescents is greater than that of male adolescents,and family psychological resources have a stronger explanatory power for the differences in the mental health level of female adolescents due to the presence or absence of siblings or the number of siblings.In short,this study confirms that siblings have a resource dilution effect on adolescent mental health and that this resource dilution effect varies by gender.