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Stereotyping by Blood Type and Birth Order
BySusan Newman, Ph.D.Your blood type can influence your sex life;Japan has condom dispensing machines (seephoto) with slot designations for type A, B, O, or AB buyers.Beyond the obvious medicalimplications, your blood type could also be very significant in determining whom you dateand how happy you are—that is if you live in Japan.In Japan, blood type establishes who you are these days. You are deemed sensitive,anxious, curious, or selfish according to blood type. That’s become common (and accepted)Japanese wisdom. Forget that this theory has no scientific basis. Nonetheless, it is theoverarching determinant in all things from finding a compatible mate to finding a job.With its roots in Nazi ideology,
The Japan Visitor 
explained the origins in an article onJapanese culture, “Blood Types - Capillaries hold key to character”: “It all started in 1931 in Japan. Furukawa Takeji (1891–1940) proposed that therewas a link between blood type and personality after working in the administrationdepartment of a high school and observing the temperamental differences betweenapplicants.Furukawa proposed that we humans are simple beings, only requiring twopersonality types. His report stated that people of blood type A were generally mildtempered and intellectual, while people of blood type B were the opposite, essentiallydividing the population into the ‘good’ and the ‘bad.’ In the 1950s, 60s and 70s “Masahiko and Toshitaka Nomi, a father and son team,were responsible for making this a mainstream science, having researched the wayin which blood type affects every area of our lives, including relationships, work andleisure.” A recent series of books (one for each of the four blood types) elucidates how blood typeindicates personality traits—type A people are sensitive and perfectionists, for example;Type Bs are cheerful and selfish. If you are an O, you’re classified as stubborn and ABs aresaid to be unpredictable. The books topped Japan’s bestseller list last year selling more than
 
five million copies. Citizens, including the Prime Minister, are buying into blood-typing as apersonality decider.Is adopting a belief in blood-type branding any more erroneous than deciding someone isconscientious, reticent, bossy or self-centered based on his or her sibling status? Blood typeto define your character has its dissenters, but the debate seems far less intense than theone on birth order that has been raging for decades.
Stereotyping by Blood Type and Birth Order
The assignment of labels, be it by blood-type or position in the family, is stereotyping. Birthorder proponents have done essentially the same thing as the Japanese—they adhere totheories that pigeonhole and discount individuality and outside influences. In his 1996 book, “Born to Rebel,” Frank Sulloway, professor at University of California Berkeley, proposed thatthe core dimensions of personality were influenced by birth order. Summary points from oneof Sulloway’s lectures reads: “Firstborns often serve as a surrogate parent and tend to bemore closely identified with their parents than are laterborns. As a consequence, firstbornsare inclined to defend the status quo, whereas laterborns tend to react against it.” Sulloway’s research led to tagging first-borns, achievers and ambitious; the youngest,spoiled and attention-seeking and more inclined to risk-taking.Although Sulloway’s theories have been embraced, he has detractors who find holes in hismethodology and thinking. The only true way to ascertain that birth order is the overridingcontributor to personality characteristics is to study the children within each family, not tocompare families, say Sulloway’s challengers. Genetics also need to be weighed in theequation as does the family environment and economic status. Consider too, family sizeand/or dysfunction. Any and all affect development. Since trying to replicate Sulloway’sresearch unsuccessfully and being criticized for some of his conclusions, Sulloway hasbacked off a bit. A few months ago he told a
USA Today 
reporter, “People love to pigeonholeindividuals by birth order. These are modest difference. It’s important to understand thatthere are a lot of exceptions to these generalizations.” Where you stand in the family hierarchy simply doesn’t fully explain who you are. Geneticsplay a role as well; we know that the propensity toward shyness is genetic. In her study of popularity among college students, Alexandra Burt, Assistant Professor of Psychology atMichigan State University found that the most popular students turned out to be the oneswith a particular form of a serotonin gene that was also associated with rule-breakingbehavior. Burt told me that, “the gene in question could be found in anyone (where at leastone biological parent had the gene as well), regardless of birth order.” For sake of argument,it is highly probable that Sulloway’s risk-taking youngest child, could then be the middlechild or oldest if he or she has the required gene. And then there is the debate on I.Q. andbirth order, but I’ll save that for another time.
Hurrah for the Only Child, But…
In Sulloway’s research,the only childfared best. Sulloway reported that only children arethe “least predictable subgroup…and tend to be more variable than individuals with siblings.” 
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