If you have siblings, you are likely to have had the ongoing debate about who is mom's favorite. The One Thing Moms Never Tell 
 
 Though a good mother would never admit it, she really does have a favorite child, according to previous studies conducted by the research team. Apparently, those adults who were perceived to be closer to the mother experienced more tension from their siblings, while also feeling greater responsibility for taking care of their aging mothers. Dr. Jill Suitor, a professor of sociology at Purdue, and Dr. Karl Pillemer, a professor of gerontology in medicine at the Weill Cornell Medical College, first began their collaboration on the Within-Family Differences Study (WFDS) in 2001. The study involved 725 adult children from 309 families who were a part of the Within-Family Differences Study - a longitudinal project that aims to gain a better understanding of the relationship between parents and their adult children. Mothers in each family were aged between 65-75 in 2001 when the study began, and data on children's perceptions of favoritism and disfavoritism from mothers were assessed 7 years apart. Specifically, the researchers looked at data on four measures of favoritism and disfavoritism: children's perception of emotional closeness with their mother, their perception of conflict, their perception of pride from their mother, and their perception of disappointment. “Adult children who reported that they were most emotionally close to their mothers also reported higher depressive symptoms,” wrote the authors of the new study. Sibling rivalry due to favoritism may induce depressive symptoms 
 
 The team found the highest reports of depressive symptoms came from children who believed they were emotionally closer to their mother than their siblings and those who believed they were the sibling their mother was most disappointed in. Commenting on the take-home message from their results, the authors say: 
 
 "These patterns suggest that the association between psychological well-being and both favoritism and disfavoritism can be accounted for by processes involving social comparison rather than equity for both black and white adult children in midlife." Using data from a study in which mothers reported on all adult children, we addressed the question: Do patterns of maternal favoritism moderate the impact of children's problems on psychological well-being?
– Always hoped you're mom's favorite? A new study out of Purdue University finds that the favorite child is actually more prone to be depressed as an adult, researchers report in the Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences. Looking at 725 adult children from 309 families in the Within-Family Differences Study—a longitudinal project documenting various aspects of relationships between parents and their adult children—they say that depressive symptoms were most common in the adult children who claimed to be emotionally closer to their mother than their siblings, reports Medical News Today. That also held true for "the children with whom their mothers had the greatest conflict, and in whom the mothers were most disappointed," write the authors. Interestingly, the study found no difference between male and female children, but it did find a racial disparity, notes Medical Daily. Adult black children felt their mother's disappointment more acutely than their white counterparts. Researchers hypothesize that sibling rivalry may be behind the depression, meaning more attention or support from mom doesn't necessarily beat out the negative attention from jealous siblings. Or that the favorites are more often asked to help the aging mother, which is its own source of stress. (The adult children in the study had mothers who were 65 to 75 when interviewed.) And yet a third possibility is posed by Bustle: A mother's attention may naturally drift toward the weakest or most sensitive child, thus her favoritism doesn't necessarily cause depression. Researchers plan to look at whether similar results play out with fathers, and whether it's possible to predict favoritism. (One study finds that young kids in religious households are less willing to share stickers.)