Onlies Make Friends as Easily as Others

Olivia certainly makes friends easily. I don't think she's overly outgoing (like I am) but she wants company so she seeks it out. I've noticed, at the parks around here,

>Do you think that studies like this will help alleviate the false stereotypes of only children?<<

Well, I certainly hope and wish that it will! It's just silly to think that Onlies are isolated and socially stunted. I don't know ANY kids that aren't involved in a million things these days, it just doesn't make any sense to keep thinking that Onlies somehow manage to remain "unsocialized."

I had read a different article about the same study (this one... http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/16/only-children-as-social-as-their-peers/ ) and it kind of annoyed me even though the findings were meant to comfort and reassure me. I'm starting to think the only people not shocked by these findings are us parents of Onlies!! For one thing, I wonder about the original 2004 study, in which teacher evaluations were used "to conclude that only children had less self-control and fewer interpersonal skills than students with at least one sibling." Makes me wonder if the teachers knew they were evaluating onlies vs. kids with siblings or if the evaluations were truly blind. For another thing, this quote by the researcher rubbed me the wrong way: ""If we're right about the mechanism, that greater interaction throughout a child's school years causes that deficit to disappear, one thing parents could do is to look for opportunities for interaction before kindergarten," says Downey.
"Preschool, play groups – those opportunities provide great exposure to those peer interactions that would reduce or eventually eliminate that gap that we observed before kindergarten."

Does it really take a genius to figure that out? Does he think we need studies to teach us how to provide interaction for our kids?? This is not rocket science! I have to say I find it a bit insulting. I do like the line from the iVillage article about happy parents = happy child. I couldn't agree more with that, and it's similar to something I've preached on this board for years...if you don't make a big deal out of the fact that your child is an Only, they won't see it as a big deal either.

WARNING: Tirade alert.

As the parent of an only child who has had difficulty socializing, I