Personality of children is the basis of who they are. Birth order is a child’s rank by age in comparison to siblings. Birth order has a profound and lasting effect on the psychological development of children. Birth order thus has a powerful effect on the personality, behavior, and emotions of children. The position of birth order gives each child a unique emotional experience each with unique advantages and challenges.
According to Al–Khayat & AL-Adwan (2016), birth order influence the manner in which children deal with work, love, and friendship. Further, firstborns are dethroned who have a lasting influence on a second born. When a child is raised alone, or when they are the youngest, they tend to gain highest attention from parents. The attention from parents has a way of influencing children. Additional births in a family lead to changes in family set up and interaction due to a number of factors (Lehmann, Nuevo-Chiquero, & Vidal-Fernandez, 2016). The changes in turn affect the personality of children. According to Shah & Jadav (2016), birth order provide clues to personality and different variables affect their outcomes. These variables include spacing of children, sex, physical differences, and family structure.
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When parents have a first born, they tend to give them undivided love and attention for a period of time. The experiences have emotional benefits to the child. Usually, parents tend to remember the last days of labor, exact time of birth, and the first time they talked or walked among others. By default, the children grow naturally as leaders. They grow self-confidence, have some sense of security, and they feel loved (Cross, 2013). However, parents always have too much expectation from them. Second born have advantage of learning from firstborn and enjoy attention from more self-confident parents. However, the feeling of helplessness from knowing little compared to the firstborn also affects their personality. Middle children enjoy the benefits of learning from older siblings as well as having young one that look up to them. Thus, personality development of children is affected extensively by birth order.
References
Al–Khayat, M. M., & AL-Adwan, F. E. Z. (2016). The Effect of Birth Order on Personality Traits and Academic Performance at Sample of Families in Jordan. European Journal of Social Sciences , 52 (2), 151-161.
Cross, C. (2013). How Does Birth Ordre Affect the Development of a Child’s Personality?
Lehmann, J. Y. K., Nuevo-Chiquero, A., & Vidal-Fernandez, M. (2016). The early origins of birth order differences in children’s outcomes and parental behavior. Journal of Human Resources , 0816-8177.
Shah, M. D. P., & Jadav, M. (2016). To what extent does Birth Order affect our personality?. International Journal of Social Impact, Volume 1, Issue 3, 2016 , 85.
