Does Birth Order Effect Your Life - Part 2 - Firstborns

By Marcia Kaye

The high-achieving first-born.

Birth order research from around the world suggests that first-borns often have more in common with one another than with their own siblings.

Eldest children quickly learn how to please parents, becoming conscientious, organized, reliable, and little mini-parents to their younger siblings.

They're high achievers and choose solid, established professions such as law, medicine, education or accounting, rising to leadership positions.

Check out the birth orders of the leaders of the five major parties in Canada's recent federal election: Stephen Harper is the eldest of three; Michael Ignatieff and Elizabeth May the elder of two; and Jack Layton and Gilles Duceppe the eldest of four. First-borns, all.

This doesn't surprise Tucson, Ariz., psychologist Kevin Leman, author of a series of books on birth order including The Birth Order Book: Why You Are the Way You Are.

"First-borns will always rule," says Leman, who has often appeared on Oprah, The View and many other TV talk shows. Various studies have shown that first-borns are two to three times more likely than last-borns to become CEOs.

Stacey Sutherland, 43, of Aurora, Ont., acknowledges that she's a typical first-born. "I'm not one to run out and buy a birthday gift at the last minute," says the eldest of four. "It's done five days early." She excelled in school, majoring in the detail-oriented field of administrative and commercial studies, and obeyed her parents' strict rules around curfews and dating-rules she says were non-existent for her youngest sibling. Although she has three school-age children, Sutherland's house is always tidy. "I'm organized, I love order, I can't operate in chaos, and I love to make lists and check things off. But my younger sister is definitely not like that. She pulls everything together at the last minute."

First-borns, believing there's one correct way to do things, can be critical of other ways.

Leman says that later-borns, which include middle and younger children, tend to notice this at family get-togethers. "At the family Thanksgiving dinner at your house, even though you may have a master's degree and you've raised four kids, your older sister who always told you how to do everything is now telling you how to cook the turkey."