Physical, mental, and emotional differences also play an important, if often overlooked, role in birth order. Physical, mental, and emotional differences …show more content…
A study was done on Danish women to assess the risk of first time psychiatric episodes after the birth of first, second, and third children (Munk-Olsen, Jones, & Laursen, 2014). According to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) “Postpartum depression is a mood disorder that can affect women after childbirth. Mothers with postpartum depression experience feelings of extreme sadness, anxiety, and exhaustion that may make it difficult for them to complete daily care activities for themselves or for others” (NIMH). The results from the study, which followed the mothers for one year after birth, concluded that postpartum depression has a significant root in primiparity (a woman who has given birth for the first time) and the risk of first time psychiatric episodes after declined after the second and third births (Musk-Olsen et al. 2014). The associated risk of primiparity and postpartum depression, especially concerned with the completion of daily care activities in the first year of a baby’s life could lead to deficits as a …show more content…
Vandereycken et al. Vandereycken (1992), both from Belgium, reviewed studies on family size, birth order, eating disorders in siblings, and behavioral and mental disorders between siblings in connection with eating disorders. In the studies reviewed by Vandereycken et al. the results of family size in connection with eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia, have been mixed. In one study half of the participants were only children (Kay, Schapira, & Brandon 1967, as cited in Vandereycken et al., 1992), Crémieux, & Dongier (1956, as cited in Vandereycken et al., 1992) and Rowland (1970, as cited in Vandereycken et al., 1992) found only a small number appeared to be only children. Herzog (1982, as cited in Vandereycken et al., 1992) found a greater number of only children among bulimic girls versus anorexic girls while another study showed only 12.6% of anorexics were only children compared to 47.3% of the general population of the Federal Republic of Germany. Furthermore, other studies have not seen any significant correlations between family size and eating disorders. So, although it seems that these studies done on eating disorder and family size have contradicting results it should