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Ask what their parents would say
Inherited narratives
People hold narratives about who they are, handed to them by parents, siblings, and friends or repeated to themselves. Whether or not those narratives are accurate, they become true through execution and how a person lives.
One example is a person whose mother would call them creative and hardworking, and who feels in competition with an older brother who isn't competing with them at all.
Competing with no one
Feeling in competition with someone or something that isn't actually competing back might mean a person is more resilient than most. That person won't stop until they win. Maybe they don't feel good enough for some reason and want to prove to themselves that they are.
Why do life stories shape what people do?
Northwestern psychologist Dan McAdams developed the theory of narrative identity, which holds that people build an internal life story that gives them a sense of purpose and unity. His research found that people who tell stories of difficulty turning into growth tend to report greater well-being. The stories are selective, since each person emphasizes some events and leaves out others. The story guides how a person interprets later experiences.
How do siblings shape ambition?
Alfred Adler proposed in the early twentieth century that birth order shapes personality and drive. A large 2015 study by Julia Rohrer and colleagues in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, covering about 20,000 people, found no effect of birth order on personality traits. Social comparison theory, proposed by Leon Festinger in 1954, holds that people evaluate themselves by measuring against those around them. Siblings are among the closest comparisons most people have.
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