The only child myth
Many believe lack of siblings leads to selfish, spoiled kids
August 17, 2007 - Spoiled, selfish and bratty are terms often used to describe only children, which suggest that being an only child is undesirable. Is there a grain of truth to the stereotype or is it just a myth?
Angela Hult is the mother of an only child and is an only child herself. She has felt the prejudice against so-called "onlies" firsthand. She says that when people find out that she's an only child the response is often, "Oh you must have been a spoiled brat. You must be really bossy. And wow, I wonder what you're going to be like to deal with?"
The myth of the only child dates back to the late 1800s when G. Stanley Hall, known as the founder of child psychology, called being an only child "a disease in itself."
Susan Newman, a social psychologist at Rutgers University and the author of "Parenting an Only Child," says the myth has been perpetuated ever since. "People articulate that only children are spoiled, they're aggressive, they're bossy, they're lonely, they're maladjusted," she said. "And the list goes on and on and on."
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