Abstract: During the transition from one-child to multi-child families, sibling competition and jealousy have become high-frequency social concerns and a real problem for many young parents. The birth of a younger child often leads to adaptation issues for the first-born child. Parents of the only-child families need to pay more attention to a new relationship that emerges after the birth of a second child, namely sibling relationships, which often lead to a series of problematic behaviors among siblings due to jealousy. Therefore, clarifying the concept, measurement methods, and theoretical mechanisms of sibling jealousy is of great theoretical and practical importance in seeking strategies for healthy child development in the context of the multi-child policy.
This article begins with a brief overview of the concept and development of sibling jealousy.
Sibling jealousy refers to the complexity that arises when one child's close relationship with a parent in the family is threatened or challenged by another child. Many studies have shown that infants up to 1 year of age exhibit a variety of expressions of sibling jealousy. As children grow and develop cognitively, sibling jealousy undergoes developmental changes in childhood. Sibling jealousy in infancy is triggered by instinct and sibling threats to caregiver resources, sibling jealousy in early childhood is due to protests made by young children when they do not receive full parental attention, and sibling jealousy in adolescence arises primarily because of differential parental treatment.
Second, we discuss the measurement of sibling jealousy, including the interviews and the triadic experiment.
The interviews focus on jealous behavior and its severity in daily life. One is the Sibling Jealousy Interview by Thompson and Halberstadt, which measures the frequency, duration, and intensity of children's sibling jealousy as well as children's views and reactions to jealousy events. The other is the Sibling Inventory of Differential Experience, which measures siblings' perceptions of differential parental treatment, including six dimensions: privileges, chores, conflict, emotions, punishment, and time spent together. The triadic laboratory paradigm, a common situational experimental observation method for assessing sibling jealousy, is designed with a 9-minute jealousy scenario coded for emotional jealousy and behavioral dysregulation.
Finally, theoretical mechanisms on sibling jealousy are described from the perspectives of individuals, families, and interrelationships, respectively. Directions for future research are also proposed. In terms of research contents, the psychological mechanism of sibling jealousy is revealed in depth. In terms of research methods, the virtual scenario experiment paradigm should be created. In terms of research value, the transformation mechanism and positive significance of sibling jealousy are examined in depth.

Key words: sibling jealousy, measurement, triadic laboratory paradigm, theoretical mechanisms

摘要： 同胞嫉妒指家庭中一个孩子与父母的亲密关系受到同胞威胁或挑战时出现的认知、情感和行为的复合体,对于寻求三孩政策背景下的儿童健康发展策略具有重要意义。本文首先从关系视角下简述了同胞嫉妒的概念及发展;其次介绍了同胞嫉妒的测量方法,主要包括访谈法和情境实验观察法;最后分别从个体、家庭及相互关系的视角阐述了同胞嫉妒的理论机制,并提出了未来研究需要深入揭示同胞嫉妒的影响机制、创造虚拟情景实验范式和深入考察同胞嫉妒的积极意义。

关键词: 同胞嫉妒, 测量, 三合会实验法, 理论机制