7/23/2006

Lively Rivalry

I enjoyed thumbing through some TIME magazines in spare moments over the weekend.

The July 10, 2006 issue had an article by Jeffrey Kluger about the impact your siblings have on who you turn out to be. This interested me as I've got a ton of the damned things you know.

Some of the points dealt with how siblings of the opposite sex can affect whom you marry, how not being the favourite might work to your advantage and why your siblings might or might not be your best role model.

The tastiest read for me was about the psychological phenomenon called de-identification. This is a process that comes into play when siblings decide whether to pattern themselves on or differentiate themselves from their siblings. Through this process, a sibling can make choices after observing other siblings engaging in risky behaviours or dangerous habits such as substance abuse.

Without engaging in too much defaming, to my many siblings I would just like to offer a heartfelt thank you. I successfully de-identified and didn't even know it.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

OHMYGOD! I totally believe that to be true. I have nothing witty or clever to add to this except that I copied this, fought that, and definitely experimented it all!

bluestocking said...

I patterned myself on my big sister because she was very successful--miserable, but successful. Whereas my next sister did everything exactly the opposite of what we did, which means she was not successful, but hey, she showed us that she wouldn't follow the pack!

Dale said...

Isn't it great to have testing grounds filled with siblings? You all turned out pretty good Tanya.

Same seems to be true of you BD. Hope you're as successful or more so than your sister but less miserable.

I've learned to be only part time miserable.

X. Dell said...

So Dale, how many siblings do you have?

Dale said...

100 siblings X. Dell. Sorry, I meant to say 8. I stand 8th out of the 9. I've wished alien abduction on half of them and I'm pretty sure the other half came from another planet.

X. Dell said...

Another planet? You mean, like Newfoundland?

Dale said...

Haha, some might consider Newfoundland another planet and you were close but different province.