Growing Up as an Only Child
Overview
This is a blog that is on socialization written by an author of whom is an only child. In it, she shares her experiences.
Growing Up as an Only child
Maddie Blew
Jesse Peters
Throughout my entire life, I have been an only child. When I have talked about being an only child with friends that have siblings, I have found that our experiences growing up were very different. The majority of socialization I had with people around my age were within my Mesosystem, which were my friends and other peers at school (Arnett, 2013). Up until my adolescent years, I spent the majority of my time around adults because I would go to functions with my parents and be surrounded by their friends. It wasn't until I got into middle school and high school that I really had a friend group my age that I spent the majority of my time with.
Not having siblings or other family members near my age made it difficult for me to transition into the school environment because I was very unsure of how to interact with people my own age. Growing up in a small family was also very uncommon and nearly unheard of in my community. This is because families in my town were very religious, unlike my family, and had four of five children in a single family. These families also all grew up near other family members, such as aunts, uncles, and cousins; all of my cousins lived far away so I was unable to gain that close family bond I saw so many of my friends have. I have grown to not have a super close relationship with anyone in my family, besides my parents, since I never was able to get to know any others while growing up.
Most African cultures vary greatly from the experience I had growing up as most families are large in number and all members greatly depend on one another for support. On average, most African families have "4.5 children " while North American families have "1.9 children,” on average (Pison & Anthropologue, 2019). While the families are bigger than what I had growing up, many African families live in poverty and are also dependent on the children working, which is not how my parents raised me. Children in Africa grew up being very independent and doing things for themselves while also working, where as I grew up completely dependent on my parents since we didn't live in poverty and it was not necessary for me to support my family (Pison & Anthropologue, 2019).
As an only child in the United States, I had a very different experience growing up compared to the adolescents in many African cultures. I missed out on the socialization that comes with siblings, but I also feel as if I had many advantages as an only child, such as not feeling the stress of being compared to older siblings. African cultures had big families and had to work for everything they had; I feel fortunate that I don’t have to, and have never had to worry about working or caring for younger siblings while focusing on my schooling.
Arnett, J. J. (2013). Adolescence and emerging adulthood: a cultural approach (Instructors 5th edition). Upper Saddle Ridge River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.
Pison, G., & Anthropologue. (2019, June 25). Why African families are larger than those of
other continents. Retrieved from http://theconversation.com/why-african-families-are-
larger-than-those-of-other-continents-84611