I understand pseudo classes and can code them when need be, but I'm still confused on why you would code css li:first-child {}; to target the first child in a list. Wouldn't it be the "first-child" of the 'ul' and not the "first-child" of the 'li'?

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Posted June 11, 2015 3:07am by

Clarity on "child" of "parent"

I understand pseudo classes and can code them when need be, but I'm still confused on why you would code

li:first-child {};

to target the first child in a list. Wouldn't it be the "first-child" of the 'ul' and not the "first-child" of the 'li'?

February 5, 2016 8:36pm

Agree, the language is rather counter-intuitive. A more accurate name would be first-occurrence-as-a-child, but that is rather long.

1 Answer

June 11, 2015 3:14am

Hey Jason,

The "first-child" pseudo class is used to represent any element that is the first child element of its parent element. You call "first-child" on the child selector you wish to target, not on the parent element. From the MDN: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/:first-child

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