Are we shaped more by our genes or the environment in which we grow up and live?
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The phrase “nature versus nurture” refers to a long-standing debate in human biology: to what extent is our behaviour shaped by our genes (nature) or by the environment in which we grow up and live (nurture)? The short answer is that it is a bit of both.
Many pre-scientific thinkers argued that the human brain was a blank slate or tabula rasa. In other words, they believed that babies were born without any pre-existing knowledge, habits or skills and had to learn everything through experience. This idea can be found in the writings of the philosophers Aristotle and Ibn Sina (also known as Avicenna) and more recently in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke. Believers in the blank slate model also emphasised the role of nurture in shaping human behaviour.
The opposing viewpoint emphasising the role of nature is called innatism. With this perspective, babies are thought to be born with certain built-in knowledge and ideas. This view was held by Plato and later by René Descartes. The strongest versions of this pro-nature viewpoint hold that experience doesn’t create new knowledge, but merely helps us unearth knowledge that our brains already contain.
The truth seems to be a complicated mish-mash of both ideas. We are shaped by both our genes and by our experiences, and the two interact in complex ways: it isn’t so much “nature versus nurture” as “nature with nurture”.
AdvertisementOn the nature side, there is clear evidence of genetic influences on many of our behaviours. For instance, it appears that facial expressions are at least partially inherited. Our genes seem to affect how well we do in exams. Perhaps reassuringly for parents who are struggling to do what is best for their children, there is some evidence that how kids are raised and schooled doesn’t seem to affect their achievements much, provided they aren’t severely neglected or abused. As people get older, their inherited propensities appear to outweigh the effects of childhood experiences.
However, the evidence that the environment affects us is equally powerful. Most dramatically, there are cases of children who have lived in the wild with minimal human contact. They typically struggle to learn to speak and can prefer to walk on all fours.
Similarly, children who are neglected as babies often have developmental difficulties. There is also evidence that abuse changes youngsters’ brains, making them more likely to be abusive as adults. Furthermore, while male and female brains may not be identical, there is evidence that parents treat boys and girls differently, leading to greater differences in behaviour than the innate differences alone could generate. Even our risk of disease, which we often think of as being heavily influenced by our genes, is much more strongly connected to the microorganisms and other experiences to which we are exposed.
One way of thinking about this is that our genes shape our temperament, but the specific choices we make are much more closely linked to our experiences.
What’s more, nature and nurture can interact. One mechanism for this is epigenetics – our experiences can affect our genes, at least temporarily. For example, mice that learn to fear a particular smell seem to pass that knowledge on to their descendants. These epigenetic changes start early in life, so if we could run our lives over, we might well turn out differently.
Questions
- The word “psychology’ comes from:
a. Latin
b. Spanish
c. Greek
d. Italian - Psychology is defined as the scientific study of:
a. people and things
b. emotions and beliefs
c. perception and religion
d. mind and behaviour - The scientific approach is more useful at answering
questions about ______ than questions about ______.
a. facts, values
b. ideas, emotions
c. values, facts
d. emotions, facts - According to the text, the lower level of explanation corresponds to
______ processes.
a. social
b. cultural
c. biological
d. interpersonal - A psychologist exploring the impact of a new drug on activity in the brain is working on the ______ level of
explanation.
a. lower
b. middle
c. upper
d. all of the above - A psychologist studying what makes people laugh in different countries around the world is working on the
______ level of explanation.
a. lower
b. middle
c. higher
d. none of the above - Different people react differently to the same situation. This is referred to as:
a. multiple determinants
b. nativism
c. the Simpson effect
d. individual differences - ______ is to nature as ______ is to nurture.
a. environment, genes
b. conscious, unconscious
c. inaccuracy, accuracy
d. biology, experience - The term “tabula rasa” highlights
the importance of ______ in shaping behaviour.
a. genes
b. experience
c. nature
d. predestination - The Greek philosopher ______ believed that knowledge is acquired through experience and learning.
a. Archimedes
b. Rousseau
c. Plato
d. Aristotle - ______ is to nature as ______ is to nurture.
a. Plato, Aristotle
b. Aristotle, Plato
c. Pliny, Archimedes
d. Stavros, Pliny - ______ is the belief that the mind is
fundamentally different from the body.
a. mindism
b. dualism
c. centralism
d. specialism - The school of psychology whose goal was to identify the basic elements of experience was called:
a. experientialism
b. dualism
c. functionalism
d. structuralism - Which of the following was most closely associated with the structuralist school of psychology?
a. Titchener
b. James
c. Descartes
d. Watson - Darwin’s theory of ______ argued that
physiological characteristics evolve because they are useful to the
organism.
a. extreme usefulness
b. natural endowment
c. natural selection
d. natural wellbeing - ______ was to structuralism as ______ was to functionalism.
a. Wundt, Titchener
b. Wundt, James
c. James, Titchener
d. Milner, Thompson - Freud championed ______ psychology.
a. psychodynamic
b. cultural
c. conscious
d. biodynamic - Which school of psychology
believes that it is impossible to objectively study the mind?
a. functionalism
b. behaviorism
c. humanism
d. socialism - Receiving an electric shock would be an example of a ______ whereas being frightened would be an example of a ______.
a. stimulus, response
b. punishment, reward
c. reaction, emotion
d. reinforcement, stimulus - Dr Pula wants to explore differences in child-rearing practices between British and Chinese parents. She is most likely
a:
a. cognitive psychologist
b. physiological psychologist
c. cognitive-ergonomic psychologist
d. social-cultural psychologist - Nature is to ________ as nurture is to ________.
a. environment/genes
b. conscious/unconscious
c. genes/environment
d. unconscious/conscious - Freud emphasized the role of ________ in shaping people’s personality.
a. free will
b. unconscious desires
c. hormones
d. group influence - Evolutionary
psychology has its roots in:
a. behaviourism
b. collectivism
c. functionalism
d. structuralism - Most human behaviour:
a. can be easily explained
b. has multiple causes
c. stems from unconscious desires
d. depends on social influence - A forensic psychologist would be most likely to study:
a. the accuracy of eyewitness memory
b. the impact of advertising on shopping behaviour
c. the effect of hormones on decision making
d. gender differences in learning styles - The behaviourists rejected introspection because:
a. it was too slow
b. it invaded people’s privacy
c. it yielded too much data
d. it was too subjective - Another term for reinforcement is:
a. stimulus
b. reward
c. response
d. condition - East Asian cultures tend to be more oriented toward ________ while Western cultures
tend to be more oriented toward ________.
a. individualism/collectivism
b. collectivism/individualism
c. cultural norms/social norms
d. social norms/cultural norms - Watson and Skinner both contributed to which school of psychology?
a. functionalism
b. cognitive
c. social-cultural
d. behaviourism - Which field of psychology would be most likely to study the influence of
over-crowding on conformity?
a. personality
b. cognitive
c. clinical
d. social
Answers
- c
- d
- a
- c
- a
- c
- d
- d
- b
- d
- a
- b
- d
- a
- c
- b
- a
- b
- a
- d
- c
- b
- c
- b
- a
- d
- b
- b
- d
- d