‘They’re driving me mad,’ is the common complaint of parents with more than two children, as their offspring thump around the house, screaming, hitting, biting and pinching toys.

It's an unusual family where brothers and sisters don’t fight. Children are programmed to compete for your attention from the start, and it might seem as though they will go to any lengths to be noticed by you. 

And while you might hope that having two children close in age, or the same sex, will create a closer bond, in fact, they might fight even more to stand out as an individual.

Healthy competition?

Sibling tension can be frustrating to live with, and many parents worry that conflict will damage their children's relationship with each other later on.  The good news is, that in fact this type of behaviour is normal and healthy - and can help children develop a range of important social skills in a safe environment.

According to Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish, authors of ‘Siblings Without Rivalry’ (Piccadilly), these are the potential, positive outcomes of healthy family in-fighting:

• By struggling to establish dominance over each other, siblings become tougher and more resilient.
• Physical fighting teaches children speed and agility.
• Verbal sparring teaches them the difference between being ‘clever’ and ‘hurtful.’
• Living with each other’s irritations teaches siblings to assert themselves, defend themselves and compromise.
• Envying each other’s special abilities inspires brothers and sisters to work harder, persist and achieve.
• Fighting teaches them consequences.

However, to help your children reap the benefits of healthy sibling rivalry you need to teach them to resolve their differences.

Role models

For a start, it’s worth looking at your own behaviour. Do you and your partner shout at each other when you argue? Is that what your children see? Remember, that under 5s will model their behaviour on adults, yet unlike you, will not possess the adult skill of conflict resolution or the parental ability to hand down consequences to each other. That is something they need to learn from you.

How can I help them resolve their differences?

If you always resolve your children’s conflicts for them they will not learn to do it themselves. And if they don’t learn how to do this as children, they will not be able to resolve conflicts at work or college or school later on.

Before you start, try to remove as much rivalry as possible first by spending one-on-one time with each child, as well as together as a family. Just playing a game with one child for ten minutes will make them feel special and take away some of their need to compete for your attention. Talk positively about each sibling to the other, too, to bolster their view of their brother or sister.

After that, clinical psychologist Lizzie Dark of Lyn Fry Associates suggests the following methods for helping them deal with their rivalry:

1. Start by setting ground rules about how you expect your children to respect each other’s feelings and property. Clarify what belongs to whom. List the objects such as the TV that they have to share, and the toys and books that they don’t have to share.
2. With shared objects, such as the TV, don’t always allow the youngest child to go first as this will breed resentment in older children. Instead, let one choose the TV programme one day, and another the next.
3. If your children follow the rules, give them lots of praise. If they don’t, follow up with consequences. 
4. When you hear your children start to fight, give them 30 seconds before you step in to see if they can figure it out by themselves. Avoid giving them attention during this time. If they resolve the issue, praise them. If they don’t, separate them for time out and follow up with consequences. 
5. Choose a time when they are not fighting to coach them on conflict resolution. You could set up a fake scenario (acting it out for the under 3s). For example, you could say: ‘What happens if one of you wants to watch TV and the other wants to watch a DVD?’. Your children will enjoy brainstorming the possible solutions with you. Then look at the pros and cons of each one, taking into consideration the needs of each child. Reach the best solution together –in this case, perhaps, allowing one child half an hour of TV, and the other child half an hour of DVD.

Remember, sibling fighting may look aggressive but children fight with their siblings because they know they will always forgive them. And any closeness or lack of closeness they form as children, often has no bearing on how siblings get on when they grow up.