ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how sibling rivalry and other salient features of sibling interactions (including conflict, pretend play, mental state talk and attunement) might stimulate children's understanding of others' minds. It explains how sibling relationships can influence children's academic performance. For many children, fantasy play often reflects everyday life. As a result, once older siblings start at school, such play frequently involves a re-enactment of school rituals, such as taking the register, with the older sibling playing the teacher (of course) and the younger sibling (and perhaps an array of soft toys) representing docile pupils. Siblings also provide an opportunity for children to overhear complex conversations. Young children with older siblings are exposed to more frequent talk about cognitive states and engage in such talk more often than children without older siblings. Sibling interactions involve an asymmetry in knowledge but not authority, and this juxtaposition makes them ideal contexts for learning.
