FREE ESSAY ON BORN FIRST, BORN SMARTER

BORN FIRST, BORN SMARTER

Born First, Born Smarter?
The experiment that I read was Born First, Born Smarter. It was a study done by R. B.
Zajonc and G. B. Markus in 1975. They planned to see why recent research had determined
that the first-born child in a family related to certain characteristics. It was round
that first-born children tend to be more verbally articulate, less impulsive, more
active, better performers in school, more likely to go to college, and tend to have a
greater need to achieve. It was also found that earlier-born children tend to score
higher on tests of intelligence and aptitude than those born into the family later. One
of the things researchers looked at was the different environments that a first-born and
second-born enter into. The first born enters a world of just two adults. The second
child's environment is significantly different because it enters a world of two adults
and one young child. I believe this would have a big effect on the second child because
he/she's parents will have to give attention to the first-born along with the
second-born.
Zajonc and Markus developed a theory to explain the relationship between birth order and
intelligence. Their study was somewhat unusual because Zajonc and Markus never actually
came into contact with any subjects, never observed any subjects, and never asked
subjects to do anything. Instead of actually coming into contact with their subjects,
Zajonc and Markus applied their theory to a set of data that had been gathered and
published by other researchers, Belmont and Marolla. Belmont and Marolla gave 350,000
Dutch males a Raven test, which is similar to an I.Q. test. They found a strong
relationship between the birth order of the men and their scores on the Raven test. The
scores decreased as family size increased and also declined with birth order.
Using the information provided by Belmont and Marolla, Zajonc and Markus proposed the
theory that as family size increases, the average intellectual climate of the family
decreases. Zajonc and Markus put the data from the Belmont and Marolla study into a table
that provided information about the number of children and the average intellectual score
for the children. They noticed that in larger families there is somewhat of a leveling
off or even an increase in scores for the extreme later-born children. The reason for
this increase is because the other siblings start to leave the family and contribute
towards the average intellectual climate. Zajonc and Markus also found that twins and
triplets performed lower on tests of intelligence than non-twin siblings. Zajonc and
Markus didn't try to claim that the only determinates of intellectual ability were family
size and birth order. There were other factors such as genetic heritage and prenatal care
that also contribute to intellectual development. 
After reading about this research, I feel that it was very well done. It seems to be
ethical and Zajonc and Markus had a large sample to evaluate. I personally agree with
what was found in the study. I am the youngest of three children in my family. My brother
is the oldest and he always took the hardest classes and got straight A's. My sister was
the second oldest. She was a lot like my brother but she always went to my brother for
help with her school work. Then it comes down to me. I had pretty good grades through
school; mostly B's and a few A's. It just seems like the order of intelligence in my
family goes down from my brother to me. One of the things that Zajonc and Markus couldn't
evaluate was how motivated people are. The older sibling might be more intelligent but
that doesn't mean they are a harder worker or more motivated that the last-born sibling.