Book Review: Born to Rebel
Feb. 21st, 2006 03:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jennythereaderBorn to Rebel: Birth Order, Family Dynamics, and Creative Lives
by Frank J. Sulloway
Copyright 1996
ISBN: 0-679-44232-4
In this book Sulloway proposes that birth rank is the major determining factor in an individual's openness to new ideas, theories, and experiences. To test this theory he used statistical methods to analyze biographical data from 3890 people who had recorded opinions on controversial social or scientific issues in the last 500 years. Among the issues he looked at were the Protestant Reformation, the French Revolution, and Darwin's Theory of Evolution.
In general, Sulloway's theory is that the earlier a person's birth rank is, the more likely they are to be conservative; while the later their birth rank, the more likely they are to rebel against the status quo. He also points out that this conservative versus rebellious isn't necessarily against the standards of society but rather the standards within the family. A first born will attempt to support (or even exaggerate) the theories and values that they were taught as a child/young adult, where a later born will be more likely to support new ideas. Sulloway also looks at how factors like sibling spacing, gender, personal temperament, and amount of conflict with parents interact with birth order to affect the basic inclinations.
I found this book and theory to be absolutely fascinating, and will be doing another post later this evening about how it seems to explain parts of my own life. Overall it was easy to follow the theories, although the statistics got a little dense from time to time.
Rating: 8 out of 10.
I didn't add much to my To Read List, as most of Sulloway's resources seem to have been journals & magazines.
by Frank J. Sulloway
Copyright 1996
ISBN: 0-679-44232-4
In this book Sulloway proposes that birth rank is the major determining factor in an individual's openness to new ideas, theories, and experiences. To test this theory he used statistical methods to analyze biographical data from 3890 people who had recorded opinions on controversial social or scientific issues in the last 500 years. Among the issues he looked at were the Protestant Reformation, the French Revolution, and Darwin's Theory of Evolution.
In general, Sulloway's theory is that the earlier a person's birth rank is, the more likely they are to be conservative; while the later their birth rank, the more likely they are to rebel against the status quo. He also points out that this conservative versus rebellious isn't necessarily against the standards of society but rather the standards within the family. A first born will attempt to support (or even exaggerate) the theories and values that they were taught as a child/young adult, where a later born will be more likely to support new ideas. Sulloway also looks at how factors like sibling spacing, gender, personal temperament, and amount of conflict with parents interact with birth order to affect the basic inclinations.
I found this book and theory to be absolutely fascinating, and will be doing another post later this evening about how it seems to explain parts of my own life. Overall it was easy to follow the theories, although the statistics got a little dense from time to time.
Rating: 8 out of 10.
I didn't add much to my To Read List, as most of Sulloway's resources seem to have been journals & magazines.
