About the Sibling Project

The Sibling Project began in 2011 with the goal of finding out how siblings of children with chronic disorders experience their everyday lives and how best to support them. The project is a collaboration between researchers and clinicians at Norway’s National Center for Rare Diseases, Unit Frambu, and the Department of Psychology at the University of Oslo. You can read about the project team here.  

In its initial years, the project group conducted qualitative research on both siblings’ life experiences and sibling support groups that were offered at the Frambu Competence Center for Rare Diseases. This work has been described in several international and national publications that you can read here. 

In 2012, we began developing a new intervention, “SIBS”, collaborating with families, patient advocacy organisations and clinicians. SIBS is a group intervention for siblings age 8 to 16 and their parents that focuses on strengthening the mental health of siblings by improving communication between siblings and parents. In evaluation studies conducted between 2014-2025, we found that both mental health of siblings and family communication improved after participating in our SIBS groups. A large randomized controlled trial conducted by the Sibling Project in 2020-2025 also showed promising results. Read more about these findings here.  

The Sibling Project trains professionals to facilitate SIBS groups across Norway and internationally. As of spring 2026, a total of 647 people in from 70 municipalities and 12 health authorities had been trained as SIBS group leaders. The project holds biannual courses and webinars for group leaders. You can read more about how to become a trained group leader here. 

The Sibling Project continues to develop a variety of initiatives for siblings. 

Preschool-age siblings also need support. In a literature review conducted in 2024, we found that research on this group is limited and few interventions exist. The Sibling Project therefore developed the MiniSIBS programme in collaboration with preschools, parents and clinicians. MiniSIBS is an intervention that can be implemented in childcare centres for children age 3-6 and is available for free on our website. See here for more information. 

The Sibling Project is broad in scope. We conduct extensive basic research on mental health and development of siblings. Our research focuses on communication and social relationships, and looks specifically at subgroups of siblings such as siblings of children with rare diagnoses, neurodevelopmental disorders, and eating disorders. One of our most recent focus areas is siblings who are exposed to challenging behavior in the sibling relationship. The Sibling Project also carries out method development and evaluation, addressing topics such as screening tools for sibling adjustment, assessment of family communication, and analysis methods for emotional communication. You can read more about our research and publications here.  

The Sibling Project has a wide international network. SIBS has been evaluated or is currently being evaluated in Australia, Denmark, Cambodia, the United Kingdom and the United States, while MiniSIBS is being tested in Sweden. We collaborate with researchers in the Netherlands and the United States on basic research and method development. You can read more about our international collaborations here.