I Don't Agree. Michael Brown

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СКАЧАТЬ of the two to seven age group (Howe et al. 2003, Siddiqui and Ross 1999).

      It may be that hoping for improvements after early childhood is to hope in vain.

      After all, there are also other people to fall out with – why would siblings be the only axis around which your arguments rotate? Parent/child conflicts abound, as do playground altercations and other disagreements with friends and associates. Many other hours will have been additionally ‘invested’ developing our conflict abilities with anyone we held close relationships with during our formative years.

      Statistically speaking, we’ve all potentially clocked in 10,000 combat hours by our mid-teens – and very possibly, a lot more. If falling out with those around us was songwriting, by Gladwell’s standards most of us are at the level of Lennon and McCartney. A shame there are no royalty cheques for being a high achiever in having an argument.

The frequency of all this falling out has an inversely proportional effect on what should be one of our most valuable qualities – the ability to unbegrudgingly compromise. Fewer than 12% of sibling conflicts reached consensus in some of the studies cited earlier (Howe et all 2003, Siddiqui and Ross 1999). Raffaelli’s 1992 study reported similarly, with compromise being reached only 9% of the time.2

      It’s a relief that at least some children are blessed as peacemakers and diplomats. But largely it’s the falling out that comes naturally. Thankfully, there’s plenty we can do about it.

      Heading childhood conflict off at the pass

      Kramer says her life’s work leads her to conclude that leaving siblings to work it out among themselves is the absolute worst thing you can do, tempting though it may be. And it becomes especially tempting when you learn that doing nothing in the teeth of sibling conflict has a grand and scientific sounding title: passive non-intervention – a phrase almost designed to sound like good parenting!

      I remember a flare up in an Asda freezer aisle between my three kids when they were much younger. My daughter Millie had raised the urgent query: “Is Noddy a boy or a girl?” This rapidly overheated when her eldest brother, Jake, observed that Noddy was probably hermaphrodite. When frozen ice pops were cast to the ground and stomped on, we were admonished by a stern shop assistant. Our family might still have been welcome in the nation’s favourite grocer if I’d known all I needed to do was pull the assistant up on her ignorance of what constitutes good parenting. I could have pointed out I was dealing with this outrage by passively non-intervening.

      As it is, we now do our food shopping online.

      The accepted wisdom is to back off and let children sort things out themselves, don’t be in a rush to fix your child’s problems for them, let them learn through their own mistakes. What if, as Kramer argues, that’s completely wrong? She argues for hands-on intervention if you don’t want to suffer the long-term consequences of inaction. Here’s how to get properly stuck in to all that belligerent behaviour. There are some interesting lessons here for all of us – whether we’re children or parents or CEOs.

      1 Pre-emptive strikesThe most effective strategies are pre-emptive strikes aimed at fostering positive sibling relationships. Never mind passive non-intervention or the authoritarian ‘because-I-say-so’ approach! Tie both these imposters into a large sack and beat them to death with an olive branch. You need collaborative problem solving. This demands that you work with your kids to identify the root of the conflict and a possible solution which you can then help them implement.This means waiting until the heat of battle has subsided and getting all parties round a table. This very thing was done in a 2006 study called ‘How Siblings Resolve Their Conflicts’ by Hildy and Michael Ross – both distinguished professors emeritus at Waterloo University – and Professors Nancy Stein and the late Tom Trabasso of Chicago University. Pairs of siblings were asked to revisit an unresolved dispute and attempt to solve it through discussion. As a result, 42% of discussions ended in a compromise – a huge improvement on the swathes of research I’ve referenced here, which dealt with observed naturalistic conflict as it arose.

      2 Walking the walkModelling positive behaviours also helps. If you dream of sibling harmony then you need to demonstrate what harmonious relations look like with your partner and others close to you. Trying to minimise your brood’s exposure to arguments by keeping it out of the room, for instance. Getting this wrong can lead to distinctly biblical consequences according to some academics: “When parents lack a stable value system by which to settle sibling disputes, or when their principles are capricious, bizarre, or arbitrary, the sibling relationship can become chaotic or even murderous.” So said Stephen P. Bank and Michael D. Kahn, in The Sibling Bond (1997). You’ve been warned!

      3 Reward and praise

      Finding an appropriate way to reward your offspring for being co-operative, respectful and friendly in their sibling interactions is a further winning strategy. Well done for sharing, Tarquin, let’s all get a Cornetto – that sort of thing.

      Forensic psychologist Gina Stepp (in an article about sibling conflict for vision.org) says that reward-and-praise strategies require parents to review their behaviour: instead of brushing off bullying, aggressive altercations or heated verbal exchanges as a harmless preoccupation of growing up, parents should make it clear they expect their kids to treat each other with warmth and affection. Taking the time to celebrate such behaviour when it occurs helps children to understand what is expected of them in future. Just make sure you do it consistently and frequently.

      Why we fail to use these strategies

      Alarmingly, while these strategies are the most effective and seem so obvious, they are also the least used. Kramer said parents don’t talk much about managing conflict; it’s emotionally draining, which creates a tendency to favour the authoritarian approach, or doing nothing.

      Let’s not kick ourselves, though – or our parents. In the 10,000 hours or more they spent squabbling over who got the last rhubarb and custard Chupa Chups when they were young, they probably never got an intervention from their folks either. Who never got one from theirs. It’s cyclical. It might well be that adults – in their general failure to help kids with maintaining a positive emotional climate, perspective-taking and other things that build positive relationships – are actually flagging that they need help with these things too.

      Never mind the kids, what about the grown-ups?

      It’s all very well discussing how better management of early-years conflict might improve the future lives of our kids, but what about adults in the here and now? It’s not as if any of us can travel back through time to re-run all those myriad conflicts or reverse 10,000 well-rehearsed combat hours. But don’t worry. It’s not too late to change. There are three easy fixes we can make to ensure harmony becomes a frequent visitor to the shores of our adult endeavours:

      Take perspective. Take a vow. Take a clear position.

      Three ways to achieve immediate harmony

      The lifeblood of the business I run is selling campaign ideas to advertisers. We are in the creative industries, a space where there is much conflict – indeed, many creative people would contend that to create exceptional work, conflict is vital. This makes managing creatives an interesting behavioural study in perspective taking.

      On the one hand, you have a person who is sensitively attuned to the finest vibrations of not only their deepest feelings but those of the rest of humanity – if it were otherwise, how could they meaningfully connect with an audience? On the other hand, you have a person who may be willing to shed blood at any perceived slight to their creative output or ego. I have witnessed many assertive defences of creative territory in order to СКАЧАТЬ