Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40897315›Full record

ArticleProceedings. Biological sciences2025

Age- and sex-dependent associations between the number of older siblings and early-life survival in pre-industrial humans.

Mark Spa, Euan A Young, Virpi Lummaa, Erik Postma, Hannah L Dugdale

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings. Biological sciences, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed.

  1. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Mark SpaGroningen Institute for Evolutionary Life Sciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.ORCID 0009-0009-8100-7346
Euan A YoungGroningen Institute for Evolutionary Life Sciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.ORCID 0000-0001-9370-9681
Virpi LummaaDepartment of Biology, University of Turku, Turku, Finland.ORCID 0000-0002-2128-7587
Erik PostmaCentre for Ecology & Conservation, University of Exeter College of Life and Environmental Sciences, Penryn, UK.ORCID 0000-0003-0856-1294
Hannah L DugdaleGroningen Institute for Evolutionary Life Sciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.ORCID 0000-0001-8769-0099

Funding

HORIZON EUROPE Marie Sklodowska-Curie ActionsRosalind Franklin InstituteStrategic reserach council of the academy of finlandSwiss National Science Foundation
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Siblings are an important part of an individual's early-life environment and may therefore play an important role in shaping an individual's survival. The quantification of sibling effects on survival is challenging, however, especially in long-lived species with extended parental care and overlapping generations, such as humans. Here, we use historical parish data from Switzerland to quantify how the number of older siblings and their survival status, age and sex are associated with childhood survival. Across 2941 focal individuals born between 1750 and 1870, the total number of older siblings did not predict an individual's childhood survival probability. However, distinguishing between siblings by their survival status, age and sex revealed several associations, which in some cases also interacted with the sex of the focal individual: while older brothers close in age reduced the survival of girls (but not boys), having more older sisters close in age improved their younger sibling's survival. Our results therefore suggest that older siblings play an important role in shaping early-life survival and highlight that the strength and direction of sibling-related associations are context-dependent and can arise through both biological and cultural factors.

Indexed as

LongevitySiblingsAge FactorsChildFemaleHumansMaleSex FactorsSwitzerlandcooperationfamily evolutionhuman life historyoptimal brood sizeparental investmentsibling rivalry

Identifiers

PMID40897315
PMCPMC12404817

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.