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This study aimed to explore sibling relationship quality and empathy of women in emerging adulthood. Background: The gender composition of siblings is a significant feature affecting their relationship dynamics. In particular, women, compared with men, report closer sibling relationships with their sisters and brothers. Similarly, women are better at understanding and experiencing empathy. However, it is unclear whether these empathic tendencies displayed by women are connected to their sibling relationship quality or whether affective and cognitive empathy skills may relate to sibling relationship dynamics. Methods: A mixed-method explanatory sequential design was used to evaluate sibling relationships of emerging adult women (N = 284) with standardized questionnaires and explain the reasons behind the results by interviewing a subsample of the participants (n = 9). Results: Results indicated that affective empathy and cognitive empathy were linked to sibling relationship quality of women, and major issues in the family play a crucial role in sibling closeness and empathy. Conclusion:The current study expands our understanding of the association between empathy and sibling relationship dynamics for emerging adult women. Implications: Programs designed to improve sibling relationship quality may facilitate empathy development, particularly during family crises such as divorce, death, or disease.

The Values in Action (VIA) Classification of Strengths and Virtues provides a detailed assessment of character based on 24-character strengths. The current study aimed to investigate whether these character strengths play role in adolescents' participation in extracurricular activities, specifically sports. To achieve this, a demographic questionnaire and the VIA Youth Survey (96-item) were completed by 3810 adolescents in the UK. The data were analyzed using binary logistic regression, and the findings indicated that the virtues of teamwork, perseverance, leadership, spirit, and zest were predictors of participation in sports during adolescence. The results also showed significant gender differences in character strengths and participation in sports. Female students scored higher on character strengths of prudence, perseverance, kindness, and humility, while male students scored higher on creativity, spirituality, and zest. Female students were also less likely to participate in sports compared to male students. The implications of these findings for future research and practice are discussed.

The Lifespan Sibling Relationship Scale (LSRS) is the most comprehensive self-report questionnaire available to evaluate the quality of sibling relationships based on feelings, behaviors, and opinions across child and adult periods of development. To the best of our knowledge, the psychometric properties of the LSRS have not been assessed or reported in an English-speaking population since this assessment tool was introduced 20 years ago. The current study examined the internal reliability and construct validity of the LSRS with a sample of 370 young adults living in the United States. Results indicated that the original six-factor model of the LSRS is plausible with minor modifications to measure the sibling relationship quality and with its close correlation between factors and scales.