Birth Family Structure

While both styles of parenting have their benefits and weaknesses, the educational system of the United States is built predominantly on middle class values and Concerted Cultivation. Consequently, this may negatively affect how children who aren’t familiar with this upbringing navigate their already complex academic and home lives. This imbalance within the student population can put some students farther ahead and at the same time neglect students who don’t have the resources they need to keep up with their peers. Lareau refers to this as “transmission of differential advantages to children”. She states the benefits the advantages that middle-class homes typically offer:

Structure, “something arranged in a definite pattern of organization” (Merriam-Webster, 2016) Most people are exposed to structure from the beginning. The child's first example of structure is understanding family structure. Your mother is usually the first tier supervisor; she sets the rules on meal times, play times, and rest times. What is more, If you don’t follow the instructions given; you may receive some type of discipline. If the child / employee does not respond to the first line supervisor; eventually, the issues are then moved up the to the next level of management the father / manager. Indeed, Wait until your father gets home” or wait until the manager gets here.

In the texts “That That Elusive Birth Order and What it Means for You,” and “How Birth Order Affects Your Personality,” the authors give their interpretation on the importance of birth order in siblings. The author of the first text, Susan Whitbourne, stresses the unimportance of birth order. Conversely, Joshua Hartshorne, the author of the second text, says that birth order is significant to personality, but there just has not been enough evidence until recent studies.

According to Alfred Adler, the birth order of the children in a family will largely affect how they age and the personalities which they will form. First borns enter the family as the only child. They revel in the love and full attention from their parents, that is, until the second baby comes along. Suddenly, first borns are dethroned and lose the undivided attention they are used to receiving. As a result, they tend to develop a strong sense of responsibility and protectiveness over their siblings at an early age, which often leads to them becoming authoritative adults. Moreover, when there are multiple children in the family, parents will set high

Sibling rivalry is not the only issue that was triggered by birth order, child’s personality and his or her intelligence is also involved. Some researchers say that first-borns are smarter because they are pressured to set-up the boundary for the younger siblings. They are more enthusiastic in their education for them to be role models of their other siblings. As for the younger ones, life may be or may not be easy, depending on how they will view it. They may view it positively by keeping in mind that since their older sibling get through it, they also can. Otherwise,

Using the information provided by Belmont and Marolla, Zajonc and Markus proposed the theory that as family size increases, the average intellectual climate of the family decreases. Zajonc and Markus put the data from the Belmont and Marolla study into a table that provided information about the number of children and the average intellectual score for the children. They noticed that in larger families there is somewhat of a leveling off or even an increase in scores for the extreme later-born children. The reason for this increase is because the other siblings start to leave the family and contribute towards the average intellectual climate. Zajonc and Markus also found that twins and triplets performed lower on tests of intelligence than non-twin siblings. Zajonc and Markus didn't try to claim that the only

Among the first psychologists to consider the effect of birth order on personality was Alfred Adler. Adler espoused that birth order was determinative of the amount of attention that children garnered from their parents (Adler, 1964). The first perspective on birth order thus stemmed from a belief that individuals competed for attention and for areas of strength as a response to parental expectations.

In a family, it is the relations between children and parents as well as siblings. A child’s success depends on both the physical presence of adults and attention given to the child by adults. The High School and Beyond sample shows that students who have two parents, one sibling, and a mother who expects college education have the lowest percentage of dropping out of school at 8.1%. On the other hand, students who have one parent, four siblings, and no college expectation have a whopping 30.6% of dropping out. This is caused by the absence of the single-parent as he or she is most likely working. In addition, having more siblings means that the parent’s attention is split and each child receive less consideration. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that the second category has a higher dropout rate because they have less social capital.

The first born child may be more successful due to the ‘better genes’, more parental attention and more careful parenting. A leading birth-order researcher, and a psychology professor at the University of California in Berkeley, takes the Darwinian Theory to family dynamics. He believes family roles based on birth order and competition between siblings affects behaviour and eventually shapes personality. As family leaders, firstborns tend to be more conscientious, while later-born children are more agreeable and extroverted (Christiansen, 2015). Carl Pickhardt, a psychologist in private counseling and public lecturing practice in Austin, Texas stated in an article, "Growing up as an only child can be very empowering, creating self-dedicated, strong-willed individuals who push themselves harder to achieve what they want" (Pickhardt and Goudreau, 2013). Good communication skills practised at an earlier age leads to reduced stress and rivalry and higher productivity in their future. Christiansen (2015) had said in her

The article “Strategic Parenting, Birth Order, and School Performance” explored the topic of birth order and parenting practices and its effect on academic success. Hotz and Pantano (2015) found that as birth order increased parents would be less inclined to punish their child for bad grades resulting in greater academic achievement. Both the

Zajonc also theorized that “as the family size increases that the average intellectual climate of the family decreases” (Born first, Born Smarter). At the end of this study Zajonc and Markus showed that family size does determine and affect intelligence level. Although family size affects intelligence levels the birth order is only one out of many things

Although there are a number of scientists supporting for the idea of being the firstborns is beneficial and advantageous, recent studies assert that the effects of birth order no longer are significant. The children’s intelligence depends on many factors such as family size, child spacing, prenatal factors, gestational factors, not only birth order

The family structure determines where you derive from and provides a sense of who you are. The typical family structure is perceived as a father and a mother, two children, one boy and one girl, and a pet. The typical family description described above is still promoted and expected to be the “dream family.” Author Meyerhoff, “While the nuclear family with Dad, Mom, and offspring happily coexisting beneath one roof-remains the ideal, variations in family structure are plentiful and often successful” (Meyerhoff). Meaning that a lot of families are remarried spouses with prior children and more common in the last decade same sex marriages. So, do these nontraditional families have the same qualities? Personally, I would think so. After

Psychological birth order is defined as the way a person sees or perceives his or her position in his or her family of origin. Alfred Adler believed that birth order was the way a child interpreted his or her perceived positions in the family, which is the most important to him or her. (Kalkan, 2008) In 1874, Francis Galton— the youngest of nine siblings— analyzed a sample of English scientists to find that first born were over represented and find that eldest sons enjoy special treatment by their parents, allowing them to thrive intellectually. Half a century later, Alfred Adler (1870-1937), the second of six children, suggest that birth order influences personality. According to him, the oldest, middle and the youngest child are due to their positions in family have different social experiences of coping which may form different

Historically, women were encouraged to marry and begin a family when they were in their teens. In the 1920’s women were married as early as twelve to thirteen and expected to fulfill their role in life by producing children and running a household. Since the 1970’s the average age of mothers giving birth to their first child increased from twenty-one to twenty-six years of age (Mathews & Hamilton, 2016). In the past, the age of the mother and her situation in life influenced the educational opportunities available to her child. In contrast, society today does not expect teens to marry and give birth. By today’s standards being a young mother does not bring to mind the same positive and accepted connotations as in earlier history. In fact, our society has gone as far as to enacted laws such as No Child Left Behind 2002 (NCLB) to ensure all children have equal opportunities in the educational field regardless of their status in the community (Sunderman, 2008). If this mindset was accurate, why are all children not succeeding in school? This thought indicates there are more factors that effect a child’s academic progress than equal curriculum provided by formal education. Maternal age is one of those factors that impacts the academic opportunities available to children in today’s society.