It’s seven in the evening. You’ve been out all day. You get home and, before you’ve even put your keys down, you hear the shout: “Muuum, he took the remote!” And right behind it, almost on top of it, the other one: “But I had it first!” You close your eyes for a second. Sibling fighting, again. Fifth time today.
If you have more than one school-age child, this scene will be familiar. And you’ve probably asked yourself what every parent asks at some point: why do they fight so much? Is it normal? Am I doing something wrong? Do I have to step in every time, or will it pass on its own?
The short answer is that conflict between siblings isn’t only normal: it’s one of the most valuable opportunities your children have to learn how to get along with the world. The long answer, the one you really care about, is that the way you react to those fights has a lot to do with whether they teach something or turn into a toxic pattern that lasts for years.
Let’s take a look.
Siblings fight because they’re learning to be people
When two adults argue, they normally do it with the brakes on. They can weigh their words, sit with frustration, think before speaking. Your children can’t. Or not entirely. Their prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that regulates impulses and makes considered decisions, is still under construction. And it’ll stay that way until well into their twenties.
What does that mean in practice? That when your 8-year-old snatches the remote from their 10-year-old sister without thinking, it isn’t because they’re selfish or “out to annoy her”. It’s because the impulse beat the brake. And when she responds by shouting or hitting, the same applies. They’re practising, live and without a net, the most complex social skills there are: negotiating, giving way, sitting with frustration, seeing things from the other person’s side.
And they’re practising with the safest person they’ve got: their sibling. Because they know that whatever happens, that person will still be there tomorrow. That’s why they fight so much with each other and far less with friends from school: with friends they weigh up the consequences, with a sibling they don’t.
A study published in 2024 in the Journal of Rural Revitalization and County Economy looked at how the strategies parents use to manage sibling conflict directly affect the quality of the relationship between siblings. The data were clear: when parents take child-centred approaches (listening, letting them try to sort it out, not automatically taking sides), the relationship between siblings improves in the medium term. When parents step in as judges (“you’re right, you’re not”) or shut it down (“that’s it, I don’t want to hear another word”), the relationship deteriorates.
In other words: the way you get involved (or don’t) is teaching your children how to relate to each other. And, by extension, to everyone else.
Why always stepping in backfires
Let’s be honest. Nearly all of us parents fall into the same thing: when the shouting starts, we step in. And we usually do it out of exhaustion (“I can’t take the noise any more”) or fear (“they’re going to hurt each other”). Both reasons are legitimate. But the long-term effect is disastrous.
When you come in as referee every time, three things happen:
1. Children stop looking for a solution. They know you’ll come. They don’t have to think, negotiate or give way: they just have to run and tell on the other one first. You’re turning the conflict into a competition for your attention.
2. They learn that the quickest or the loudest crier wins. If you decide in the heat of the moment, without knowing what happened, you usually side with whoever protests loudest or looks most vulnerable. The other one takes note: “Negotiating isn’t worth it, what’s worth it is making more of a scene.” And next time, they make more of a scene.
3. They don’t develop social skills of their own. Cooperating, waiting their turn, listening to the other person’s point of view, handling intense emotions without exploding. All those skills are trained by solving real conflicts. If you solve them on their behalf, they don’t get the training. They’ll reach secondary school, their first job, their first relationship, without having practised any of it.
Research on sibling relationships shows something very clear: during a well-handled conflict, children practise listening, cooperation, perspective-taking and emotional regulation. And children who develop those skills have, paradoxically, warmer relationships with their siblings and fewer fights in the long run.
The more you teach them to sort it out, the fewer fights you’ll have to put up with.
When you DO need to step in
Before going on, this matters, because some families swing to the other extreme. “Not stepping in” doesn’t mean “leaving them to it whatever happens”.
You need to step in, without hesitating, when:
- There’s real physical violence (not a shove, but punches, biting, actually hurting each other).
- One is treating the other in a systematically abusive way (repeated humiliation, manipulation, constant exclusion).
- One of them is clearly emotionally overwhelmed and can’t regulate.
- There’s a big difference in age or ability and the conflict is unequal from the start.
In those cases you stop what’s happening, separate them if need be, and attend first to emotional regulation, not to “who’s right”. Later, when things have calmed down, you can talk.
For everything else, which is the 80% of everyday fights over the remote, the spot on the sofa, “he came into my room”, “she took my stuff”, you really can stay out of it. And, better still, you can teach them to sort it out on their own.
How to teach them to sort it out (step by step)
This doesn’t happen in a day. It happens slowly, through repetition. But it works.
Step 1: Announce the change of rule. At a calm moment, not in the middle of a fight, sit down with your children and explain that from now on, in small conflicts, you won’t be playing referee. You’re going to trust them to sort it out. If they need help they can ask you to mediate, but you won’t be coming in uninvited.
Step 2: When the fight starts, don’t go in. Carry on with what you were doing. If you can hear them from the kitchen and there’s no violence, keep chopping the onion. Hold on. The first few times will be very hard, because they’re used to you going in. They’ll turn the volume up to make you. Hold on.
Step 3: If they come looking for you, offer mediation, not a verdict. When one (or both) of them comes to find you, don’t ask “what happened?” or “who started it?” Ask: “What do you two need to happen now?” And let them think. If they ask you to decide, hand it back: “I wasn’t there, so I can’t decide. But I can help you reach an agreement.”
Step 4: If the situation calls for it, structured mediation. Sit the two of them down. One talks, the other listens without interrupting. Then swap. Then you look together for a solution that works for both. Not “a fair solution according to Mum”, but one they both sign up to.
Step 5: Recognise it when they’ve sorted it out well. This is key and almost nobody does it. If you see them playing together again two hours later, say so: “You had a big fight earlier and you fixed it yourselves. That’s really hard. Well done.” What you recognise gets repeated.
What they learn when you let them sort it out
When you stop being the referee and start being the coach, your children don’t just fight less. They learn things that will serve them for the rest of their lives:
- To negotiate without dominating or giving in.
- To sit with frustration when they don’t get exactly what they wanted.
- To read the other person’s emotional state and adjust how they communicate.
- To look for creative solutions rather than ones where someone has to lose.
- To separate the person from the problem: being angry with their sister today doesn’t make her the enemy.
These are exactly the skills that later decide whether they become adults who can negotiate a salary, sustain a healthy relationship, manage a team at work. And they get trained on the living-room sofa at the age of 9, arguing over the remote.
That’s why role-playing games work so well
At Rolin we work on exactly this: we give children a space where they have to resolve conflicts (inside the game, with characters, with missions) without an adult giving them the answer. They negotiate. They get it wrong. They try again. And they take home skills they then use with their brother or sister without realising.
Because when they play, they’re working. And when they work, they’re playing.
If sibling fighting at home is wearing you out, try this first: for one week, in small conflicts, don’t go in. Hold on. Watch what happens. You’ll be surprised at what your children can do when you give them room to do it.
And if you’d like a concrete tool for training these skills deliberately rather than improvising, there’s a free guide to get you started.