The Advantages of Larger Families

I come from a family of five kids. I enjoyed my childhood, and I thought a big part of that was having several siblings. The opportunities for interactions with different siblings made each of my relationships better than it would have been if I only had one sibling. A single child has no sibling interactions. Two children have only one sibling combination: A and B. I call this a "versus" relationship. Three children have four sibling combinations: A-B, A-C, B-C, and A-B-C. Four children have eleven sibling combinations: A-B, A-C, A-D, B-C, B-D, C-D, A-B-C, A-B-D, A-C-D, B-C-D, A-B-C-D. As each child is added, the combinations for sibling interactions increases exponentially. I think this is healthy for children and healthy for families.