The association between sibling bullying and psychotic-like experiences among children age 11–16 years in China

•Using standardized tool to explore sibling bullying in Chinese adolescents.•Divided psychotic-like experiences into bizarre experiences, perceptual abnormalities, persecutory ideation and magical thinking in China.•Exploring the relationship between sibling bullying and subtypes of psychotic-like experiences. Few studies exist on sibling bullying or even sibling aggression more generally in the past 30 years. Studies of sibling bullying have shown that sibling bullying may associate with depression, anxiety, self-harm, suicide ideation in early adulthood. Nevertheless, few studies have explored the relationship between sibling victimization types and the occurrence of psychosis, not to mention that psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) always occur before psychotic disorders. Therefore, the current study aims to examine the association between sibling bullying and PLEs among children age 11–16 years in China. This is a cross-sectional study which included 3231 students from eight junior middle schools in three cities of Hunan Province, China. Frequency and types of sibling bullying was assessed with Sibling Bullying Questionnaire and PLEs was assessed with Community Assessment Psychic Experiences-42. The percentage of sibling bullying were 12.9% for victimization and 10.8% for perpetration. Sibling bullying plays as an independent influence factor for all subtypes of PLEs, and verbal victimization was the most important risk factor in developing different subtypes of PLEs followed by physical victimization and verbal perpetration. The current study found that sibling bullying is associated with PLEs. Intervention programs should be conducted to focus on those children and adolescents who are involved in multiple types of sibling victimization or perpetration.