Hyunho Jung/page25 initial draft/Summer session

Forer explains a child's personal character in accordance with his different birth orders. From my perspective, however, she is not accurate on most of her arguments about birth orders shaping one's identity. It seems that she failed to provide sufficient amount of valid reasons to support her argument.

First of all, there are many evidences that her model about the first child does not fit for most of people. To begin with, a friend of mine once said her siblings see herself as if she is a role model of theirs even if she is a middle child, by always asking advices when they are in trouble and look for praises when they have done something that they think it is good. Therefore, she always tries to be a grown-up woman and become independent from their parents. This shows that it is the person and his characteristics that make himself a role model of others, not his birth order.

Furthermore, Forer argues that the first child usually imitates their parent's speech and behavior. However, it seems that it depends on how one's parents act to their children and others. From my own experience, for instance, I sometimes tried not to imitate most of the parents' behaviors because I feared to be like one of them. It was because their attitude about treating other people was not admirable at time to time. They sometimes yell at others and become bossy when things are not going in the way they want to do so. This rendered me to decide that I should figure out and make myself not to mirror any of those disrespectful attitudes from them. In this respect, Forer's statement that the first children tends to imitate their parents does not appealing.

Lastly, Forer should consider more about other factors that shape one's identity: society and culture. These two factors are related to numerous aspects of our life, and therefore are the inevitable causes to change our lives. On the other hand, Forer does not mention any of these even though she explained what creates and fosters one's personality. Even saying that her argument is valid, social and cultural factors can change the tide in how a human being shapes himself or herself. This represents the fact that it is hasty to generalize factors of shaping one's characteristics and personality by their birth order only.

In a nutshell, Forer's argument does not seem convincing in accordance with the fact that the numbers of exceptions are too many and there are other important factors that should never be outlooked.