BEHAVIOURAL GENETICS

Question 1

What is behavioural genetics?

Answer 1

The interdisciplinary scientific effort to establish causal links between genes, behavioural traits and neural mechanisms.

Question 2

what is the aim of behavioural genetics?

Answer 2

To distinguish the genetic and environmental contribution to behaviour, and the interactions between the two.

Question 3

what is polygenic inheritance?

Answer 3

a large number of genes contribute cumulative small effects towards significant heritability of a behavioural phenotype, with a normal distribution

Question 4

what is heritability?

Answer 4

Proportion of phenotypic variance that can be accounted for by genetic differences among individuals

Question 5

what are the 2 different types of environment?

Answer 5

shared and non-shared

Question 6

what are adoption studies?

Answer 6

Adoption studies look at the impact of nurture on children who are raised by parents who are not their biological parents… If the child grows up with traits that resemble the adoptive parent more than the biological parent, this is stronger evidence that these traits are due to nurture.

Question 7

what are some criticisms of the adoption study?

Answer 7

kids may not be very representative of others as they have been separated from parents
adoption agencies try to match children to families that are similar to the childs biological family
danger that adoption studies may draw attention to the differences between adopted children and their step-brothers/sisters, can create self-doubt

Question 8

what are twin studies?

Answer 8

comparing the behaviour of monozygotic twins (share 100% of DNA) and dizygotic twins (share 50% of DNA) can show how much of an influence nature has.

Question 9

what are some criticisms of twin studies?

Answer 9

because twins are often treated the same they can start to behave more like each other
twins are rare
they may have different upbringings
they may draw attention to the twins and make them feel unusual