Show twins
Twins are drawn with their child lines meeting at a single point, and identical twins are distinguished by a bar between the two lines. This article explains how to mark two siblings as twins and how to change the type afterwards.
McGoldrick, Gerson and Petry (2020) draw twins with their child lines descending from one point, so that the twins stand side by side within the sibling group. Identical twins have a horizontal bar joining their two lines, and fraternal twins have none. The same convention applies to triplets and to other multiple births.
The editor has no button for marking twins, so twins are added through the Assistant, which requires a connection to the drafting service. Draw both twins as siblings before you begin.
Procedure
- 1
Press I, or click Assistant on the tool rail. The field Describe a change… opens.
- 2
Type an instruction that names both twins, such as “Emma and Oliver are identical twins”, and press ↵ Enter.
- 3
If the proposed change appears with a Keep button, click Keep or press ↵ Enter. The child lines of the twins now meet at one point.
- 4
If the assistant shows the change in a review list instead, click the button at the foot of the list that adds it to the genogram.
- 5
If the type is wrong, click the short line between the meeting point and one of the twins, and select Fraternal or Identical in the card that opens.
- 6
If the two siblings are not twins, click the same line, and click Not twins.
The Hale–Okafor sample family includes a pair of fraternal twins and a pair of identical twins, which show how both types are drawn. Samples are opened as described in Open a sample family.
Only one of the two short lines above the twins responds to a click. If the card does not open, click the line above the other twin.
Twin lines
Keyboard shortcuts
- I
- Open or close the assistant.
- ↵ Enter
- Keep the change that the assistant proposes.
- Esc
- Undo the change that the assistant proposes.
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