Birth Order Research Paper

Whitbourne explains the stereotypes surrounding sibling roles, such as the first-born is most likely to take on the leadership position, and tend to “stick to rules and order, and strive toward achievement

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

Birth Order Paper (1) Mother, Father, and 2 daughters: this is the structure of my family. My mom, Ann, is the person I’m closest with in my family, and she is 36 years old. She works at Plattsmouth Middle School as a 5th grade science and Social Studies teacher. My mom is an extremely funny, personable, compassionate, loyal, and intelligent person. She got pregnant with me when she was in college (she was 21), was left by the father, disowned by her family, on welfare, and still trying to earn a degree.

This causes for a person’s personality to be different from those of others. For a child being born second, it is sometimes difficult to achieve as much or do as well as the first child did. Nothing seems good enough to the second born child (Isaacson 3) . "The second child being born usually tries to out do everybody" (Isaacson 3). Again, this is a difference in personality depending on when and how you were raised. This child is going to turn out different then the first born child.

Though, birth order illuminates a majority of our personality traits and decisions such as, career and romantic relationships. Parents get wrapped up in the ‘firstborn haze’ and overlook how much pressure they put on older siblings. By creating a pressure to be the best and ‘in control’ the older sibling takes on the leadership role and often becomes more aligned with doing better in school than younger siblings. Determination and intelligence correspond with higher level of career, and that is just what the older sibling strives for. In fact, “100% of astronauts who’ve gone into space were either eldest children or eldest sons” (State). Relationships work better if partners differ from each other and aren’t in the same birth order. The competition can be detrimental and problematic. Alfred Adler’s birth order theory provides us with useful information to reflect our decisions and explain how you think about things. By becoming aware of it we can become more familiar with ourselves and get out of the all too familiar comfort

Does birth order affect personality? Can the chronological order of which you and your siblings are born determine your fate and shape you as an adult? As many factors as there are that mold us into who we are and how we are, it's hard to believe that birth order could be one of those significant factors. Alfred Adler, founder of individual psychology, was the first to theorize and discuss how birth order affects one's personality development. Adler argued that birth order can leave an ingrained impression on one's lifestyle which is reflected on the way the person handles friendships, work, and love. Adler believed that his theory could help people understand why they are the way are so that they could improve their life as Adler put emphasis

As the mother and father of these children were in a two vs two situation with the kids, this all changes with the addition of the newest child making it a three vs two situation. When this occurs each child gets less and less time with their parents affecting the youngest the most, since he/she never got to be smothered by their parents in the first place. As the youngest grows up they appear to be more independent than any of the other siblings. This is a huge factor in their personality for they make their own decision on what they will do instead of waiting for advice or approval from someone else. The effect of their independence on their personality shows in their wild side for their caution towards dangerous activities is almost gone compared to their other siblings. Besides the fact that they are just wild and independent they seem to focus more on the finer things in life, rather than just school and education. The parents now still want their child to do very well but have a better understanding on the difficulty of school and are less strict towards the youngest child. Rather they are more understanding and thoughtful on the situation. This influences the child’s personality and makes them focus less on school, but more on all the other extracurricular and out of school activities. This corresponds with their independence for they work better independently and and are poor at being instructed, much different than all of their siblings. For their future they usually become a creator of a business or company and love to always be doing hands on work, rather than calculations and imputing

Birth order is defined as being the chronological order of sibling births in a family. There is five ways to classify birth order: first, second, middle, last, and only children. Treatment plays a large role into how strong the birth order effect is. If out of four sons, a daughter is born, even if she is a middle child she will be treated at a first born, because she is the only girl. Age gap is also a major factor affecting birth order. Large age gaps result in birth order starting over (Birth Order, pg. 1-3). Referring to birth order, Dr. Hartstein, a psychologist says, “It’s been researched since the 1920s, and they really have found that over time the things that they have found stay the same and are proven to be honest and true representations of people (1).” A child’s growth and personality are greatly affected by birth order and the effects will be carried into adulthood (Birth Order, pg.1).

Many researchers have questioned whether or not birth order and sibling structure play a role in dictating one's success in education. Research shows that firstborns tend to exceed their siblings in intelligence and achievement levels (Cheng, Wang, Sung, Su, & Li, 2012; Boomsma, Beijsterveld, Beem, Hoekstra, Polderman & Bartels, 2007; Cho, 2010; Bu, 2014; Akgeyik, 2013; Karwath, Relikowski, Schmitt, 2014; Horner, Andrade, Delva, Grogan-Kaylor & Castillo, 1998; Rammohan & Dancer, 2008) starting at the age of eight. (Boomsma et al., 2008). This may be due to several factors including the uneven divide of familial resources (Cheng et all, 2012; Harkonen, 2014; Rees, Lopez,

Alfred Adler an Austrian psychiatrist was one of the first theorists to suggest that the position of a child in a family by their birth order is a factor that may affect their needs and development and therefore behaviour (Lindon, 2012a, pp. 21). By being the middle child out of the three, Brian could possibly have a second child syndrome. He may experience competitive outlook and jealousy toward his older brother and behave differently in order to show his characteristic that are exact opposite of the first born. For that Brian may often be seen as the troublemaker, especially if his older brother is co-operative and obedient (Riddall-Leech, 2003, pp. 80-81). Adler believe that middle children tent to have a lack of drive and confidence, no sense of belonging that can cause depression and loneliness which is similar to Brian’s behaviour.

For the final presentation for this course, I have decided to discuss Alfred Adler’s birth order theory. I essentially decided to choose this topic because I found it extremely intriguing on how someone’s birth order could have a profounding effect on their personality. Also I was able to relate to this topic on a personal level compared to some of the other theories. Meaning, when learning and talking about birth order, as the first born in my family I was able to compare a lot of my traits to the ones described. It was interesting to see a psychologist create an actual theory trying to explain this idea. Which lead me to discuss in my presentation, how Adler developed this particular theory, its contributions to describing personality, and recent research advances. First, I will give a little biography of Adler and explain ow he got into the psychology field. Along with his reasons on focusing on family constellation, and he came to developing this distinct theory. As well as describing what birth order theory which points out the order of which children are born into the family. It mentions how each child possess certain personality traits simply on the order in which someone is born. Second, I will also discuss how this concept continues to have an influence in popular psychology. I will also be mention why this theory is considered to be conversional to some psychologist, and how it affects the research. Lastly, I will be talking about how birth order has impacted the

With regards to my parents, I will play an important role taking care of them as they age. As a firstborn child, i have the responsibilities of helping my parents when need be and caring/setting an example for my younger brother. Already, I am assisting my parents in any way that i can (e.g. house chores, errands, heavy lifting, driving); more so than my brother. While my parents are currently working, eventually they will reach the age of retirement and will have to rely on my brother and I more. When they reach that stage, I will have to be a caretaker for them. I will especially be needed in matters requiring heavy physical activity.

This investigation will study how birth order affects creativity and risky behaviour throughout developmental stages. This is an important issue as many previous studies surrounded birth have concluded birth order affects personality and lifestyle. The theory of birth order holds an importance to the study of psychology as it has also been concluded that birth order can affect behavioural choices and metal process. The purpose of this investigation is to determine whether a child is born first, second, third or last is linked to the development of the child’s personality and behavioural choices, specificity creativity and risk taking. This investigation will also examine if the roles and norms that have been placed on the status of a child

For instance, in my family I have an older sister who is ten years older than my twin brother and I. Since we are so far apart she might’ve developed some of the characteristics of an only child. Since my brother and I are twins, we differ from the normal middle and youngest child. Twins in the birth order theory normally have one leader and one follower or one that is more dominant. This is not the case, we have such dominant personalities that we fight all the time. Be that as it may, this is not the case for us.