ABSTRACT
Multiple births remain one of nature's most fascinating and revealing phenomena. Usually considered a delightful, curious event, the birth of twins and other multiples actually activates numerous biological, sociocultural, and psychological dimensions. Prior to the use of the hormone drugs to induce pregnancy, the occurrence of multiple births beyond twins was rare. Singleton full-term infants were reported by Kurzberg and associates to have higher performance on the visual following and auditory orienting items than low-birthweight infants. The Australian twin study has reported reading delay, particularly in decoding, among twin males of high intelligence as measured by the performance scale of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Revised (WISC-R). A frequent patterning that is reported for twins is a dominance-submissiveness relationship. Early infancy problems necessitating separation from mother may influence early bonding conditions and may interfere with the natural synchrony of the early relationship and its reciprocity.
