Essay on The Effect of Birth Order on Learning and Development

Parents’ own birth orders and children experience can impact family dynamics, such as, firstborn parents getting into “raging battle” with a firstborn child, youngest-born parents not having high expectations on their kids or seeing their children’s abilities, biases based on their own birth positions, sticking up for the children with the same birth order, and birth order affecting the children’s personalities.

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 is addressed as the arrangement of births of children in a family. The four most common positions used in the Birth Order Theory of Alfred Adler are: only child, first born, middle child and last born. Adler associated those birth order positions with different characteristics for each. He also explained that with every child that will be added to the family there will be an effect for each family member in terms of communication, tasks and duties. (Craighead 2001)

Birth order refers to the order in which children are born into their families. Common examples of this include the first-born, second-born, youngest and the only child. Birth order is considered to have profound lasting effects on the psychological and behavioural development of children. For this reason, it is essential to study birth order and its impacts on children within families in Canada because it reveals more about the individual in society. A child’s birth order is incredibly influential in regards to their upbringing, shaping their personality and how they grow up to be as individuals. First-born children generally have a great amount of pressure and responsibility placed on them. The youngest children of families

Though there are specific temperaments and personality traits commonly found in each birthplace, it does not signify that each characteristic perfectly fits a single child or adult in that order. Many variables interfere with the general traits found in each birthplace and can easily change the personalities of that specific order. A complete change in birth order characteristics can also result from these specific interferences. Both circumstances in the outside and inside world take effect and are called the variables of birth order. These variables are very important to keep in mind while looking at this subject. Dr. Kevin Leman, an internationally renowned psychologist, and New York Times Bestselling Author, lists some of the major variables found in many children and adults in his book The Birth Order Book. The spacing of up to five years or more, gender, physical and mental disabilities or difference, deaths in the family, and also spacing will interfere and alter the personality traits found in each birth placement. This list of variables can continue on, but looking at these can provide insight to those dealing with doubts towards their specific birth order or where they may fit

The object of this experiment was to determine whether or not birth order actually affected personalities and to see if oldest/youngest stereotypes were true. Oldest children are said to be bossy and rule followers while youngest tend to be ambitious and outgoing. To find out whether or not these assumptions were true, ten people were asked a series of questions about oldest and youngest children and what it was like growing up.

Birth order can have an effect on many personality traits and even a child’s future occupation. First borns are more likely to become managers because their order in the family trains them to have more responsibility. This responsibility allows the child to have more managerial and leadership skills. For example,

Adler's information that he came up with was solely based on one-on-one psychotherapy with clients as he listened for connections to childhood. Adler wrote, "Whenever I have studied adults, I have found impressions left on them from their childhood lasting forever. The position in the family leaves an indelible stamp upon the style of life" (Forer&Still, 1976, 6). He believed that a child's birth order impacts their personality by the way they treated by their parents and other siblings growing up. One key component that he focused on was that children of the same family aren't born into the same environment therefore each child is raised more or less significantly different. After many therapy sessions of different adults, he sorted out common characteristics and patterns for particular and specific birth order positions including: firstborn, middle child, last born and an only child. Adler's study on birth order effects on personality left us with a basic list of common yet unique set of characteristics for each

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,

They are always the youngest born of the family so they are pampered and cared in diffirent ways. This later birth position was associated with both advantages and disadvantages in terms of family background and personal history in a study conducted by Fergusson, Horwood, and Boden, (2006). The parents already have experience with the previous children so in the last born, care and parenting was lost rigid and instead is a loose part.  Therefore, the youngest child usually breaks the rules in family and more liberal. The parents slack off when the youngest discipline that last born child has rebelled and impulsive. they tend to want to get attention from others and often impatient with the hard work of life because they always get help form parents or siblings. because of getting good experience things from others, last born child often expect good things from life and tend to be optimists. The last born has less expectations from parents so instead making decision for themselve, the parents or siblings often make decisions for them and they will have less confidence about decision-making because of be less ambitious than other . they will consider to creative or artistic pursuits . Last born children are followers much more than leaders, and will happily follow a leader they respect as they always follow brother when they was

The first journal article I found is called “Birth Order Impacts: Real or imagined? A Review of Literature Past and Present” and this article is very interesting because it details how research has proven that this in fact it is true. “Even Charles Darwin, the revolutionary biologist who proposed the theory of evolution based in natural selection, took a stance that birth order must impact how an organism travels through life” (Govek, 2012). The author also states very good points of research that has been done with infant temperament. “Starting as early as infant temperament, researchers have posed that a child’s later personality can be determined. Where birth order is concerned, it can have an impact on personality, as it has an impact on

Alfred Adler, a psychologist, proposed the idea that has been experimented and ultimately has been proven correct. The order in which children are born has an extreme effect on the children in a household. The youngest child is often showered with affection, which leads to the child becoming overly dependant on his parents. The eldest child however, learns responsibility at a young age, and learns self sufficiency. This is because when a new member of the family is introduced, the oldest child is forced to fend on their own in terms of attention. They learn how to clean up after their siblings, and also care and respect for younger children. An older child may feel jealousy and possibly depressed when the attention is suddenly divided unevenly towards them and their younger sibling. At times, the oldest child is even neglected. Although the order of birth has been proven to have effect on children, there are no specific patterns as to how a child will definitely turn out. Zane A Maus conducted an experiment. In his experiment he wanted to figure out if birth order did indeed have an effect on personality: “According to Adler, middle-borns have attributes and needs that are much different from that of their first or later-born siblings. Middle-borns tend to have the need to “dethrone” the oldest born by beating the expectations set for by their parents and to eventually become the dominant

Is there a “personality tag” for each child, depending on their birth order? Does the family size, or even the parents’ life styles, affect anything? Birth order is more than just an old wives’ tale about predicting the personalities of each child in every family. “Birth order, put in its proper context, is a key that can unlock personalities and give you a new perspective on human nature.” (First- born?,1). Every child of every family has a personality tag, just because of their spot on the immediate family tree. Family size and birth order are factors that make the “personality tag” for the first born, middle child, last born, and only child of each family.

Birth order can no longer be the scapegoat for misbehavior. While many people would like to blame birth order for certain personality traits as well as behavioral patterns, birth order can no longer take responsibility. Sometimes birth order can have correlation with specific behaviors that are exhibited, but it is not a big deciding factor in the grand scheme of things. A writer for the Huffington Post recently explained that “These links between personality and birth order ring true for many people. But decades of research have failed to show any consistent and substantial association between birth order and any personality trait” (Haslam). As children grow up, they tend to have a bend toward a certain personality type. Many factors are involved in shaping who people will become, however, birth order

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