Israeli study: Children who have siblings with disabilities are more empathic

A new study by Israeli researchers indicates that the brothers or sisters of children with disabilities may have a better level of cognitive empathy, leading to better social skills in later life.

Researchers at the Hebrew University and Cambridge University, including post-doctoral researcher at Cambridge’s Autism Research Centre, Dr Yonat Rum, worked on the study, one of the first to examine the positive effects of growing up with a sibling with a disability.

The work was carried out by re-examining analysis from the Longitudinal Israeli Study of Twins, which includes 1,657 families of twins born in 2004-2005. Sixty-three sets of twins in this group were children where one twin had a disability and the other was developing as expected.

The children were surveyed and asked to complete a questionnaire when they reached the age of eleven. Their parents were also involved in the study.

The data found that, when compared to sets of twins in which both children were developing typically, the sets of twins in which one had a disability, showed a higher level of cognitive empathy in the non-disabled twin.

Rum said: “Those children who grew up with a twin with a special condition were displaying a higher level of cognitive empathy. This is important in the development of social skills”. She said that studying twins rather than siblings of different ages in the same family offered a level playing field, so that there was no hierarchy of age which could possibly distort the study.

Over 1,000 families. Searched database to find one twin with disability. Compared the typically developing. Grew up with twin wit special a condition. Higher in cognitive empathy, human ability to understand others. Emotional element, cognitive empathy vip skill.