Why your big brother or sister is always one step ahead

Times Online ^ | 22 August 2005 | By Alexandra Blair, Education Correspondent and Alan Hamilton

[shrinkermd]

PRESIDENTS Bush, Clinton and Carter would support it. Cherie Booth is proof of it. The first born achieves the most success in life.

[shrinkermd]

They forgot to add Lyndon Baines Johnson who had another genetic marker--second tallest after Lincoln.

[mass55th]

"The first born achieves the most success in life."

Not in my family.

[Red Badger]

Charles Dickens would dispute those statistics.......

[flashbunny]

John stossel debunked the birth order BS earlier this year.

Of course, it doesn't prevent people from trying to make a buck off of it.

[camle]

neither my older brother nor my older sis are better off than I, neither is younger sis.

some things just cant' be predicted.

[netmilsmom]

>>The first born achieves the most success in life.<<

In my family, the oldest is an Ex-Cleveland Teacher/ ex-LPN/Flaming Lib/Lesbian with Munchausen Syndrome who has lived most of her life on the Dole.

There goes that theory.

[bitt]

'Munchausen Syndrome '!!!!lol!

Is her name 'Cindy Sheehan?

[netmilsmom]

>>Is her name 'Cindy Sheehan?<<

Ya know! When I first saw CS, I thought, "Wow, this would be my sister if one of her boys were a hero."

[dsc]

"Children in large families with an educated mother were worst off."

Hmmmmmmmm, could this be a clue as to why some people are so eager to reject this study?

[surrey]

Mine either. The youngest is by far the best educated and the brightest. Also has the most ambition.

[auto power]

.ahahahhaha...the first born in our family constantly makes an Ass out of himself....hahahaha

[trebb]

I am the first-born and have done better than my sister and brother, but much of that is the timing. I got used to the idea of working for a living and had the values of older generations as examples to follow; my sibs got caught up in the "take care of me" generation.

[SMARTY]

My brother can do calculus in his head and always had tons of money but his personal life is like a dirty novel. It's OK though...we still love him.

[Preachin']

"The first born achieves the most success in life."

That statement is relative to what one seeks.

My wife and I are both first-borns and believe that there are general traits for first, middle and last-borns.

First-borns are generally much more mature, but that's because they grew up observing their parents with no competition for the first few years.

The other kids had their older brother or sister to watch. That may have been a big deal for the new child, but that big brother or sister was still just a a child.

I have a lot of experience with children. I have three of my own and am a children's pastor. I have been working with kids altogether in a church/classroom setting for 15 years.

The firstborns are terribly bad about paying attention to the conversations of adults and giving their opinions.

The youngest kids tend be big risk takers. They are often judged for making mistakes, but many miss their achievements.

One factor that people often miss is that the youngest child often has first born traits if he/she was born well after the previous child.

[Prime Choice]

The report shows that a first born is most likely to complete a year more in education, either at school or university, than the fourth or fifth born.

Curious. I'm third out of four and I've gone further than all of my brothers combined.

I'd say this article is just more "junk science."

[TET1968]

So bogus.

[Zeppelin]

I'm the oldest and doing well for myself, but success is all relative anyway. This article only reaffirms two things for me.

1. The media only considers success in monetary terms.
2. Science can skew "results" or "observations" any way they like in order to match their predetermined "conclusions."

[sittnick]

Yeah, Neil "Moon" Reagan achieved much more success than kid brother Ronnie.

[OldEagle]

"The first born achieves the most success in life."

Exactly how do you measure success? Each of my three siblings has more money than I and I wouldn't trade.

[shrinkermd]

Comments on this article seem to be ignoring:

"...A 10-year study of nearly 1.5 million Norwegians has concluded that, regardless of family size and income, the eldest child is the most successful academically and at work..."

One cannot fault sample size (they did almost all children in the cohort)nor the results. Of course, one could debate the measurement--money, education, etc.

What I find fascinating is how people approach a statistical study. It seems most (actually close to all) judge the study on their personal birth order or birth order experience. It says a lot for why empirical research is so often ignored and, especially so, in the soft, social disciplines.

Some political science guru should take note of this personal approach to statistical data. The personal approach more or less confirms Mark Twain's assertion that what most people call thinking is actually emoting. Further, the aggregation of this emoting is called public opinion --most see this as final, some see it as God speaking.