Australia’s cousin crisis: Sad trend undermining modern families

Aussie children today have fewer cousins than ever before, in a huge demographic shift that experts say has serious implications for society as families become smaller and older.

If you were a kid of the 1970s you spent half your life hanging out with your cousins. They lived round the corner, sprang up like weeds and grew up alongside you like another set of siblings but nicer – because they didn’t live in the same house.

Now, as birthrates plummet and families disperse, kids have fewer cousins. Throw in family estrangement, like we’ve seen with the Beckhams and Prince Harry, and these once treasured attachments are fast disappearing.

The fact cousins are a dying breed isn’t just a demographic shift, it’s emblematic of a huge change in society’s fabric, leaving younger generations less connected and more vulnerable, according to experts.

Research from the UK, which has the same birthrate as Australia, shows that the average child in the 1970s had about seven cousins while today’s child has closer to five with projections suggesting that figure will fall to four by the end of the century.

The reasons are clear: families are smaller, geographical mobility is higher and extended networks that once underpinned social and emotional life are thinning.

Justin Coulson, psychologist and co-host of Parental Guidance, says while the falling birthrate is typically observed through the lens of productivity, the decline in cousins has a negative impact on society.

“Cousins have always formed the bedrock of communities and kin, protecting one another, supporting one another and engaging with one another,” he says.

“That’s where we built our empires and it’s where we’ve had connection because it’s where we’ve always been most seen and heard and valued.

“So when you reduce the size of your network, you become more vulnerable, not just physically and financially, but socially and emotionally. You reduce the quality of connection and instead of a family get together or a funeral having 20, 30 or 40 people relying on each other or mourning together, we now lack those elements.”

Whereas Prince Harry grew up with six cousins from his father’s siblings and another 12 from his mother’s, Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet only have three cousins who they have no relationship with due to the rift between their fathers.

In his memoir Spare, Harry writes of his close relationship with his cousins, particularly Princess Eugenie, while Prince William has a warm bond with his cousins Zara and Peter Phillips.

He called on the pair, as well as Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, to help him host a garden party last year when the Princess of Wales was absent while she underwent cancer treatment.

Cousins aren’t just playmates, they’re social anchors. Yet in Australia, where families are often dispersed, this isn’t just a statistical quirk but a huge change in the way society is scaffolded.

As Coulson points out, your relationship with siblings and cousins typically outlasts that with your parents.

“While friends come and go, these are the relationships that last the longest and so our lives are poorer for the lack of nourishment and companionship that those relationships bring,” he says.

Playdates in the park with the extended family are a wonderful part of growing up for many kids, but experts say declining birthrates are undermining these “social scaffolds”.

The depletion of cousins is also being felt in popular culture. Movies such as The Godfather and My Cousin Vinny pivoted on those relationships and the sprawling family networks as power structures.

Now shows such as Succession showcase the new world where siblings are the focus and the cousins have largely vanished – reduced to a single hapless Greg on the fringes.

If you were drawing these new family trees they’d look less like a sprawling Moreton Bay fig and more like a thin pine tree with fewer branches to cousins but more years stacked up with grandparents living longer.

Experts believe there will be a shift away from children growing up with siblings and cousins their own age, to them spending more time with grandparents and great-grandparents.

Diego Alburez-Gutierrez, who conducted the cousin research for the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, says families becoming older and smaller will impact today’s kids because cousins offer greater diversity than friends.

While people choose their friends and they often come from a similar social demographic, extended family offer variation in experiences and lifestyle, he says. “You get exposed to ideas or points of view that are different.”

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Originally published as Australia’s cousin crisis: Sad trend undermining modern families