Introduction

We all know the cliches about older siblings being responsible, younger ones being creative, and middle children being peacemakers. But is there any evidence our position in the family has an impact on our personality? Madeleine Finlay meets Dr Julia Rohrer, a personality psychologist at the University of Leipzig, to unpick the science behind our intuition about birth order. Help support our independent journalism at theguardian.com/sciencepod