Parents, put your faith in instinct, not stereotypes
Is the key to successful parenting the ability to propel a child towards adulthood who can stand on their own two feet? Or maybe there’s no say in it, if you absorb the latest research which says first born children are without a doubt smarter than their apparently neglected siblings.
A recent report by America’s National Bureau of Economic Research tested the theory of first born superiority via a study of Swedish and Norwegian men aged 18-20 years who also joined the armed forces.
It is a specific test group – and not your family or mine – but the results are nonetheless intriguing.
Researcher Sandra Black’s team found first borns boasted an extra three IQ points on average. Says Black, “First born children have the full attention of parents but as families grow, the family environment is diluted and parental resources become scarcer.”
Pointing to a strong trend in Norwegian men, she added, “Later born children have lower IQs on average and these differences are quite large.”
The study also linked high blood pressure and obesity as other features of the smarty pants group, such is their penalty for being superior.
But we won’t see the significance of that, such is our modern parent obsession with building the perfect child.
It used to be star signs which, some folk reasoned, had some type of influence on our kids’ trajectory to success.
I’ve even heard of people spending a weekend trying to conceive so they can deliver a perfectly balanced Libran child. Thankfully horoscopes have been relegated to the naughty corner.
Black’s survey dovetails with others which claim that the first child off the rank will inevitably have the higher IQ because, as the sole offspring at first, they bask in oodles of mental stimulation and develop crack thinking skills.
Do these surveys have a purpose other than to serve as a patronising warning that we’d better be careful with the younger brothers and sisters? No.
Despite our self-obsession none of us wants a junior diligent narcissist in the house.
And by condoning these “experts”, we make parenting hard for ourselves.
Consider tomorrow which is National Ride2School Day. The streets are meant to “come alive” with students riding, walking, skating or scooting to school.
How easier would the school run be if they got there safely on wheels themselves?
Instead, there will plenty of drive and drop offs as the parental sabotage of the mission to drum resilience into our kids continues unabated.
Or as psychologist and author Thomas Geary, author of Nurturing the souls of our children: what children need and what parents can do says: We are becoming domestic engineers where our homes are factories. And our children have become products.”
We worship measurement as a criterion for being a good parent and that’s why surveys like this latest one get traction. A child’s emotional intelligence and attitude is equally important in the formative years so they blossom in society not become isolated from it. Obvious, no? So why are we so fixated on IQ?
How damaging this could be to a vulnerable young person struggling with a family relationship, and equally so, a parent struggling to be the best they can be for each of their children.
It reminds me of the eye wateringly accurate Facebook post last year when a mum caustically observed the giddy mess parents have got themselves in.
She wrote: “Make sure your children’s academic, emotional, psychological, mental, spiritual, physical, and social needs are met while being careful not to over stimulate, underestimate, improperly medicate, helicopter, or neglect them in a screen free, processed foods free, plastic free, body positive, socially conscious, egalitarian but also authoritative, nurturing but fostering of independence, gentle but not overly permissive, pesticidefree two-storey, multilingual home preferably in a cul-de-sac with a backyard and 1.5 siblings spaced at least two years apart for proper development, also don’t forget the coconut oil.
“How to be a mum in literally every generation before ours: feed them sometimes.”
We feel successful if our children fit in and feel anguished if they don’t. We spend a redundant amount of time judging ourselves as parents and then judging our kids. As a result, we see past who they really are. Or their pleasure of being a child.
Surveys like ones on first born elitism don’t take into account environmental factors where children don’t easily fall into the birth order role or issue like blended families, children with special needs or even family break up and death of a mum or dad.
Pigeonholing children’s personalities and behaviours according to their birth order is irresponsible.
It’s based on nothing concrete and can only reinforce the guilt that every normal parent already shoulders on a daily basis.
Read the fine print of most of these so-called expert commentaries people – your child is born an individual.
Unconditional love, unwavering support, strong boundaries, clear discipline, and attention to their physical needs will help lay solid foundations.
If you allow expectations based on stereotypes to shape you as a parent not only will you cloud your instincts but you risk introducing character traits that might never have been there in the beginning.
Never give up trusting your raw instinct.