Winch, and Frank Sulloway, to name three of the biggest thinkers on the subject.For a firstborn the best match is usually a lastborn.It can even tell you which of two people would be a better match in the long run.Using birth order to find a compatible match can be a complicated matter, especially for middle children, for those who experienced the early loss of a parent or sibling, or for those who had significantly greater than average parental conflict.One modern theory of personality states that the Big Five personality traits of Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism represent most of the important elements of personality that can be measured.

Among the general public, it is widely believed that personality is strongly influenced by birth order, but many psychologists dispute this.

Michael Grose, an Adlerian-trained parenting expert and author of (Random House, £12.99), explains the basics.

‘We’re in a Darwinian struggle from the moment we’re born, fighting for scarce resources within a family – our parents’ time, love and affection,’ he says.

This assertion has been repeatedly challenged; Alfred Adler (1870–1937), an Austrian psychiatrist, and a contemporary of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, was one of the first theorists to suggest that birth order influences personality.

He argued that birth order can leave an indelible impression on an individual's style of life, which is one's habitual way of dealing with the tasks of friendship, love, and work.