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Examining the Effects of Birth Order on Personality

Author

Listed:
  • Julia M. Rohrer
  • Boris Egloff
  • Stefan C. Schmukle
Abstract
This study examined the long-standing question of whether a person’s position among siblings has a lasting impact on that person’s life course. Empirical research on the relation between birth order and intelligence has convincingly documented that performances on psychometric intelligence tests decline slightly from firstborns to laterborns. By contrast, the search for birth-order effects on personality has not yet resulted in conclusive findings. We used data from three large national panels from the United States (N = 5,240), Great Britain (N = 4,489), and Germany (N = 10,457) to resolve this open research question. This data base allowed us to identify even very small effects of birth order on personality with sufficiently high statistical power and to investigate whether effects emerge across different samples. We furthermore used two different analytical strategies by comparing siblings with different birth-order positions (i) within the same family (within-family design) and (ii) between different families (between-family design). In our analyses, we confirmed the expected birth-order effect on intelligence. We also observed a significant decline of a tenth of a standard deviation in self-reported intellect with increasing birth-order position, and this effect persisted after controlling for objectively measured intelligence. Most important, however, we consistently found no birth-order effects on extraversion, emotional stability, agreeableness, conscientiousness, or imagination. On the basis of the high statistical power and the consistent results across samples and analytical designs, we must conclude that birth order does not have a lasting effect on broad personality traits outside of the intellectual domain.

Suggested Citation

  • Julia M. Rohrer & Boris Egloff & Stefan C. Schmukle, 2015. "Examining the Effects of Birth Order on Personality," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 807, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    • Handle: RePEc:diw:diwsop:diw_sp807
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    File URL: https://www.diw.de/documents/publikationen/73/diw_01.c.522392.de/diw_sp0807.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lang, Frieder R. & John, Dennis & Lüdtke, Oliver & Schupp, Jürgen & Wagner, Gert G., 2011. "Short Assessment of the Big Five: Robust Across Survey Methods Except Telephone Interviewing," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 43(2), pages 548-567.
    2. Jule Specht & Boris Egloff & Stefan C. Schmukle, 2011. "Stability and Change of Personality across the Life Course: The Impact of Age and Major Life Events on Mean-Level and Rank-Order Stability of the Big Five," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 377, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    3. Gert G. Wagner & Joachim R. Frick & Jürgen Schupp, 2007. "The German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) – Scope, Evolution and Enhancements," Schmollers Jahrbuch : Journal of Applied Social Science Studies / Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 127(1), pages 139-169.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

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    Cited by:

    1. Qing Wan & Xiaoke Cheng & Kam C. Chan & Shenghao Gao, 2021. "Born to innovate? The birth‐order effect of CEOs on corporate innovation," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(9-10), pages 1846-1888, October.
    2. Dudek, Thomas & Brenøe, Anne Ardila & Feld, Jan & Rohrer, Julia, 2022. "No Evidence That Siblings' Gender Affects Personality across Nine Countries," IZA Discussion Papers 15137, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Black, Sandra E. & Devereux, Paul J. & Salvanes, Kjell G., 2016. "Healthy(?), wealthy, and wise: Birth order and adult health," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 27-45.
    4. Conzo, Pierluigi & Zotti, Roberto, 2020. "Blessed are the first: The long-term effect of birth order on trust," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C).
    5. Zhang, Shumeng & Guo, Naijia & Zhang, Junsen, 2023. "Reexamining the effect of birth order on cognitive and non-cognitive abilities: New evidence from China," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    6. Cláudia Custódio & Stephan Siegel, 2020. "Are chief executive officers more likely to be first-borns?," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(6), pages 1-17, June.
    7. Golsteyn, Bart H.H. & Magnée, Cécile A.J., 2020. "Does sibling gender affect personality traits?," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    8. Golsteyn, Bart H.H. & Magnée, Cécile A.J., 2017. "Does birth spacing affect personality?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 92-108.
    9. Lespiau, Florence & Hopfensitz, Astrid & Kaminski, Gwenaël, 2021. "Keeping it for yourself or your sister? Experimental evidence on birth order effects on resource distribution between kin and non-kin," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    10. Seymour Spilerman & Kieron J. Barclay, 2020. "Birth order pairings and romantic success," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2020-017, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    11. Custódio, Cláudia & Siegel, Stephan, 2018. "Are CEOs More Likely to Be First-Borns?," CEPR Discussion Papers 12613, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Kathrin Morosow & Martin Kolk, 2020. "How Does Birth Order and Number of Siblings Affect Fertility? A Within-Family Comparison Using Swedish Register Data," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(2), pages 197-233, April.
    13. Alexandra de Gendre & Jan Feld & Nicolás Salamanca & Ulf Zölitz, 2023. "Same-sex teacher effects," ECON - Working Papers 438, Department of Economics - University of Zurich, revised May 2024.
    14. Shuxi Zeng & Fan Li & Peng Ding, 2020. "Is being an only child harmful to psychological health?: evidence from an instrumental variable analysis of China's one‐child policy," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 183(4), pages 1615-1635, October.
    15. Kuba, Radim & Flegr, Jaroslav & Havlíček, Jan, 2018. "The effect of birth order on the probability of university enrolment," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 61-72.
    16. Barreto, Florencia Belén & Sánchez de Miguel, Manuel & Ibarluzea, Jesús & Andiarena, Ainara & Arranz, Enrique, 2017. "Family context and cognitive development in early childhood: A longitudinal study," Intelligence, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 11-22.

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    Keywords

    Birth Order; Personality; Big Five; Intelligence; Within-family Analyses; Siblings;
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