Born First, Born Smarter Essays - Intelligence, Intelligence Tests

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 d evelopment. 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. Psychology Essays