Birth order effects on personality and achievement within families (original) (raw)
Related papers
An attempted replication of the relationships between birth order and personality
Journal of Research in Personality, 2002
According to , firstborn children hold positions of dominance and parental favor relative to laterborn children and, as a consequence, develop personality characteristics that coincide with parental interests. Laterborns develop personality characteristics that differ from firstborns in an effort to secure parental investment. Sulloway (1996, in press) reported support for the hypotheses that firstborn status correlates positively with Surgency and Conscientiousness and correlates negatively with Agreeableness, Emotional Stability, and Openness after controlling for sex, age, sibship size, and socioeconomic status. The authors attempt to replicate these findings with self-report data provided by several hundred young adults, including a sample of full genetic siblings and a sample of mixed (half-, step-, or adoptive) siblings. For the complete sample and the full sibling sample, they replicate the negative relationship between firstborn status and Agreeableness. Contradicting Sulloway's findings, the authors document in the complete sample and in the mixed sibling sample a positive relationship between firstborn status and Openness. They find no relationships between firstborn status and Surgency, Conscientiousness, or Emotional Stability. Discussion situates the results of the current research with previous attempts to replicate ) findings. © 2002
Implications of Birth Order on Personality and Social Behavior
Cognizance Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies (CJMS), 2024
During the adjustment phase, first-year college students experience behavioral and personality changes, which such changes may provide insight into how successfully the students will manage their first year of college. This prompted the researchers to conduct this research utilizing a descriptive comparative research design, to establish a basis and explanation for first-year college students’ behaviors and personalities. The researchers selected three-hundred-four (304) first-year college students through a convenient or accidental sampling method. Based on the results of the study, it was revealed that birth order is partially a factor of personality and social behavior, specifically in parental attention personality and dominant social behaviors. It was found that there is a significant difference between the parental attention (F=7.579; df=3; p=.000), and dominant behavior (F= 4.001; df= 303; p=.008) of each birth order. This reveals that when it comes to parental attention, firstborns and middleborns receive more parental attention than only children. First-year college students who are firstborns are also more likely to exhibit dominant behaviors compared to only children. The researchers hope that this study will be used as a springboard for future research, aimed at the settlement of contradictory findings regarding personality, social behavior, and birth order. The researchers further recommend taking into consideration gender, age, socioeconomic status, parenting styles, and environment in studying personality and social behavior in relation to birth order.
2014
Assumptions about the effects of birth order on personality abound in popular culture and self-help books. Indeed, when one sibling is asked to compare themselves to others in their family, birth order shows weak-to-moderate effects on personality (e.g., . No study to date, however, has utilized a complete within-family design that includes independent self-reports from both firstborn and laterborn siblings in the same family. To fill this gap, we collected Big Five personality data on 69 young adult firstborn-laterborn sibling pairs. We also obtained data from parents of the sibling pairs and peer ratings of original participants' personality traits. Within-family analyses revealed that neither siblings' independent self-reported personality traits, nor parents' reports of their children's personality traits, differed systematically as a function of birth order. Our findings are consistent with results from between-family designs and they provide further evidence, employing a within-family design that utilizes data from multiple family members, that birth order does not have enduring effects on personality.
Alfred Adler was one of the first theorists to use birth-order position in his conceptualization of clients. Birth order continues to inform professionals practicing from an Individual Psychology framework; however, the wealth of research on the topic can seem overwhelming. Using a modified version of Light and Smith's (1971) vote-counting methodology, the authors reviewed 200 published articles with statistically significant findings of birth order characteristics. From these studies, lifestyle characteristics associated with birth order were tabulated to provide a clear picture of results. Examples of typical characteristics associated with persons of specific birthorder positions include high success and achievement for first-born children, high need for achievement for only children, high sociability for middle children, and high social interest for youngest children. Implications for counselors conclude the article.
The effects of birth order on five-factor personality traits in early adolescents
2019
On the sample of 952 early adolescents we examined the effects of birth order on five-factor personali ty traits by using between-family design. Four most frequent cla ssifications of birth order were used and their eff ects were examined not only on primary five-factor personalit y traits, but also on two higher-order meta-traits, stability and plasticity, as well as general factor of personalit y. Additionally, a number of potentially important sociodemographic variables which may confound the r elationship between birth order and personality wer e controlled for. The results of this study show that bir h order exerted no effects on the conscientiou sness and openness, while on extraversion, agreeableness, emo tional stability, higher order plasticity dimension a d general personality factor a few differences with small eff ect sizes were obtained. When sociodemographic vari ables were controlled for, relationships between birth order a nd five-factor personality traits were not c...
Given the widespread use and well-known consequences of achievement goals in different competence-relevant situations, it is important to gain a thorough understanding of how these differences in goal pursuit are formed. Using different analytic approaches, we show that birth order lies at the heart of people’s goal preferences as we consistently found that firstborns have developed a preference for mastery goals (which are based on self-referenced standards of competence), whereas secondborns have developed a preference for performance goals (which are based on other-referenced standards of competence). These findings may help explain why people differently define, experience, and respond to competence-relevant situations, including the workplace, the classroom, and the ball field.► We examine the influence of birth order on achievement goal pursuit. ► Birth order effects are tested both across and within families. ► Firstborns are more mastery oriented compared to secondborns. ► Secondborns are more performance oriented compared to firstborns.
The Effect of Birth Order on Achievement
Birth order studies have received an increasing academic interest since Adler (1920). During the last several decades a number of researchers have investigated the influence of birth order, contributing to the intelligence, career preferences and success. The purpose of the present paper is to summary the key findings from a study on the correlations between birth order and the participants’ achievement of certain indicators in a Turkish sample. Briefly, the statistical analysis concluded that birth order was significantly correlated with achievement on the ASGT scores. Secondly, the analysis of variance revealed that there were statistically significant differences between the ASGT scores of participants by gender and birth order. Finally, the regression analysis suggested that family size was found to be an insignificant predictor of the participants’ achievement scores.
Belief about birth order and their reflection in academic performance: a cross sectional study
International Journal Of Community Medicine And Public Health
Background: Alfred Adler in 1964 stated that different position in a family, birth order may be correlated to both positive and negative life outcomes. Children in the same family are different from each other in academic achievement and the effects of birth order one child/s educational achievement has been studied. The objective was to evaluate the relationship between birth order and their reflection in academic performance.Methods: The study design was a cross-sectional survey where data collected by a self-administered online questionnaire to gather information about students bio data, birth order, gender, age, siblings size, parents education and income. A total of 92 online questionnaire were distributed to the participants (34 male and 53 female). Out of which 88 participants were submitted the response. All answered data were anonymous and recommended. Data were entered in excel and descriptive statistics were performed using SPSS software version 25.Results: The result sho...
Given the widespread use and well-known consequences of achievement goals in different competence-relevant situations, it is important to gain a thorough understanding of how these differences in goal pursuit are formed. Using different analytic approaches, we show that birth order lies at the heart of people's goal preferences as we consistently found that firstborns have developed a preference for mastery goals (which are based on self-referenced standards of competence), whereas secondborns have developed a preference for performance goals (which are based on other-referenced standards of competence). These findings may help explain why people differently define, experience, and respond to competence-relevant situations, including the workplace, the classroom and the ball field.