Psychologists have long found that birth order and the total number of children in a family have an impact on their character. Raising an only child has its own characteristics.
What an only child learns from family relationships
One of the main mistakes in raising an only child in a family is the desire to surround him with excessive care and protect him from any troubles. Despite the initially good intentions, this situation has a number of dire consequences. But a child is a future adult who will need to be able to exist in this world independently.
An inadequate degree of care leads to the formation of a learned helplessness in the child when he gives up before the slightest difficulty. Then parents readily come to the rescue, leaving the child no opportunity to think about the situation on his own.
Having matured, such a person parasitizes on stronger and more independent personalities. He transfers to them all responsibility for his own life, because he does not know how to exist in another way. Often such people are capricious and demanding, because they are accustomed to their privileged position in the family.
Single children often become adept manipulators, taking advantage of their position.
Sometimes in adolescence, these children begin to protest against inadequate care, which radically changes the situation. This stimulates the development of the frontal lobes, which are responsible for planning and forecasting skills. In this case, the child has every chance to enter adulthood as a person adapted to independent life.
Features of social adaptation
Fear for an only child can lead to social isolation. Parents would rather leave the child in their reach than send them out with their peers. For insecure children, this is a particularly fatal mistake that can make them outcasts in the children's community.
Not having acquired the skills of communication with other children in time, such a child in the future himself begins to avoid interaction. In adulthood, poor socialization brings serious problems. The modern world requires communication and knowledge of human psychology, but the victim of social isolation does not own it and is often afraid to try.
Parents' expectations of a single child are often overstated. They encourage him to be the best in everything. After such a person, his whole life will be inadequate to perceive failure, feeling guilty for not meeting expectations.
Being mainly in the circle of adults stimulates early speech development, the vocabulary is often full of concepts that are difficult beyond the years. This fact affects mental development in principle. Often these children have many creative hobbies, and in adulthood they choose a creative profession.
