A Study States That Only Children Have A More Flexible Mind

The brain of only children is different from that of people who grow up with their siblings, according to an article published in the journal Brain Imaging and Behavior .

It refers to a Chinese study that states that only children have the most developed area of ​​their brain dedicated to language, but that related to emotion regulation is less advanced.

A group of Southwestern University researchers in Chongqing, China , analyzed 303 young Chinese: 126 only children and 177 with siblings. All were subjected to tests that measure their intelligence, creativity and personality. The scientists also analyzed the shape of the brain of the study participants using the images provided by MRIs.

After analyzing their results, the researchers realized that the brain of only children has an overdeveloped zone and an underdeveloped zone.

This is mainly due to the fact that the family environments in which individuals grow up affect the development of brain structure and condition personality.

Only children are very creative

The researchers found no differences in IQ, but they did conclude that only children have a greater amount of gray matter in the area associated with language, flexibility, imagination and planning.

This occurs to a large extent due to the care given by parents. That would mean that to some extent the creativity developed by girls and boys depends on the expectations and attention that their parents give them.

In the same way, the study shows that the only children analyzed have a lower amount in the middle frontal cortex, an area of ​​the brain that is associated with the regulation of emotions  and, therefore, obtained lower scores in terms of kindness, in relation to who have siblings.

The Chinese researchers stated that these characteristics could suggest that the loneliest social environment is the one that generates these differences. This is also related to the low levels of empathy that were recorded in other tests.

In turn, the reason why only daughters and sons are perceived as less pleasant could be the result of excessive attention on the part of fathers, mothers and the rest of the family. In these cases, girls and boys tend to be less exposed to external social groups and focus more on solitary activities.

This causes, according to the published article, that they present “undesirable personality traits”, such as dependency, unkindness, selfishness and social ineptitude.

“Due to the absence of siblings, only children generally miss important opportunities in terms of social relationships since they do not develop psychosocial skills or emotional support,” say the experts.

And it is also good to note that the aforementioned study is a small sample, carried out in China and where only young people were analyzed. New variables could emerge in other studies and with different age groups. So the study also has its limitations and potential biases.

However, this is the first time that a study has analyzed the brain structure of only children. In fact, there are previous behavioral research that shows results close to the conclusions of the Chinese research.

An analysis of 115 scientific studies conducted in 1986 showed that only children performed better on tests of intelligence, character, and relationships with parents than did children growing up with multiple siblings.

Stubborn personality

Only children are usually very stubborn because they are used to seeking their own interest and can often be very possessive. They can also be very strict about their privacy and time, as they are not used to sharing it with someone else.

However, the personality varies according to the living conditions of the child. The upbringing shapes the personality of the child in a very marked way.

An article published on the Internet explains that another trait of the personality of only children is that they tend to be very mature for their age, and this is a trait that is due to their environment, because since they do not have siblings, they seek the company of their parents or other adults. And since they are the only references they have, they tend to compare themselves to them.

They love to pretend that they are much older than they are, and many of them can even become the typical “smarties”.