Personality Influenced by Birth Order

Personality Influenced by Birth Order

        Have you ever wondered how your own personality has been affected by the birth order in your family?  I know I spectacle why certain characteristics are more common in latter-born children then firstborns.   Research has proven that birth order does play a role in the development of your personality.  When looking at this topic, I want to discuss how birth order affects your personality, intelligence, and physical appearance.  In addition, I want to include how my own personal life compares with my research findings.

        First off, there are many personality traits that are associated with being the firstborn child rather the latter-born.  According to Jocelyn Voo, from American Baby, firstborns usually are more reliable, conscientious, perfectionists, structured, and controlling.  Voo also included that firstborn children are always around their parents, which explains why sometimes they will act like young-adults.  Additionally, newscasters and TV talk show hosts have a tendency to be firstborn children.  When I think of my older brother in my family of two siblings, I can say that he is advantageous to me in all of these characteristics except structured.  Otherwise, Voo’s description of the firstborn’s personality is accurate.  When looking at her ideas of the last born child, she notes that they are fun-loving, social, uncomplicated, manipulative, outgoing, and self-centered.  Voo said “youngest children tend to be the most free-spirited due to their parents’ increasingly laisses-faire attitude towards parenting the second (or third, or fourth, or fifth..) time around.”   Her description of the last born children seems to describe me in my family pretty well.  I know that out of me and my brother, I am more outgoing, simple, and fun-loving than he is.    Overall, the research I did on personality I thought came out to be very accurate.  I thought that the descriptions not only replicated me and my brother, but also some other siblings that I know closely.  

        In addition to personality, I wanted to see how birth order affected intelligence.  When looking at me and my brother, specifically our intelligence, we have some similarities, but also some differences.  Overall, both in high school and college, my brother has done better than me in academics.  He had a 4.0 in high school and went to Carlson at the U of M.  I had a 3.0 in high school and went to Labovitz at UMD.  My brother (bring the first child), seems more committed to his school work, tries harder, and always seemed to get A’s.  On the other hand, I always put in less effort, tried less, and got A’s and B’s for the most part.  Now that I have outlined how the intelligence in my situation is laid out, I want to talk about what researchers have concluded in this study.  

        Amber Esping wrote the article “Does Birth Order Affect Intelligence?” from Indiana University.  In her article, she noted that the number of siblings in the family has a big impact.  Esping said how children from bigger families tend to have worse scores on intelligence tests and on educational measures.  Esping included that firstborns score better than later-borns on intelligence tests and also make few inconsistencies.  She also said “there was a gradient of declining scores with rising birth order, so that firstborns scored better than second-borns, who in turn scored better than third-borns.”