When I was involved in frequent online dating, I got in the habit of asking a series of questions fairly early on in the online conversation. After all, if you've got some deal breakers, you might as well get them out on the table and into the open before you get too far along in the relationship. Not all of my questions were about deal breakers, though. Some were just geared towards giving me some insight into how the relationship might proceed. One of those was the birth order question.

I realize that there are a whole lot of factors which make up your personality. However, I happen to think that birth order is an important one. I think that oldest children have a general tendency to act a certain way. They're responsible, driven, care-taking, independent ... Youngest children also share some basic traits; impulsivity, persistence and a love for affection. It doesn't hold true in all instances, but birth order is a good indicator of someone's very general personality traits.

I don't select my dates by birth order. But I've gotten a pretty idea of how dates will go and relationships will proceed with people from different spaces on the sibling spectrum. Each offers its own quirks and compatibility issues, each has its pros and cons but it's nice to get a good guess at what you're getting in to. And the rare person who is completely opposite their birth order stereotype always brings a nice surprise to the table as well!