Birth order and illness behavior.

While birth-order effects have been investigated with respect to a large variety of behaviors (4, 7), one of the neglected areas has been that of health. Adler's observation that the oldest born tends to be conservative and to respect authority (2, pp. 378-379) suggests that such a person would be concerned about his health, act on this concern, and utilize institutional health care services where such would be available. The youngest born, on the other hand, as an individual who tends to be more ambitious and faster, also less conventional, (I, pp. 150-151), would have less "time" to be concerned about his health and be less inclined to visit a health care service. Regarding the first born, two studies by Schachter lend support to our interpretation of Adler's observations. (a) When exposed to experimental electric shock, first born were less willing or able to withstand pain than the later born (5, pp. 47-49). (0) They were more likely to be conformers, than the later born (5, pp. 86-88). These findings suggest that, to the degree to which the older born would react to illness as they do to pain, they would be motivated to alleviate illness and, as conformers, would turn to the provided channels. Behavior related to concern about one's health has been termed by Mechanic and Volkart, "illness behavior," defined as "the ways in which given symptoms may be differentially perceived, evaluated, and acted (or not acted) upon by different kinds of persons" lJ, p. 87). Spilken and Jacobs (6) in a study of illness behavior which also considered birth order, among other factors, found that among college students requesting medical care, 61% were oldest born, while among those not requesting such care, only 50% were oldest born. But the difference was not statistically significant. The purpose of the present study was to investigate further the relationship of birth order to illness behavior by comparing oldest born and youngest born.