D1b1 The nature-nurture debate

Question 1

Nature and phobias.

Answer 1

the biological factors that affect our development, e.g genes, Combinations of our genes can affect our development, and some combinations can influence our personality and whether we develop mental illnesses. So parents with phobias may have children with phobias, as they can pass on genes that make them more “prepared” to be afraid

Question 2

Nurture and phobias

Answer 2

about the environmental influences on our development. Social learning says our behaviour changes as we observe models in our environment. In classical conditioning, we learn by associating 2 stimuli that are repeated together

Question 3

Evidence for nature and phobias argument

Answer 3

Preparedness- suggests there is genetic influence on the kinds of things we fear
Bennett-Levy and Marteau: shows that more people afraid of animals with certain characteristics- could be the ones that our genes make us more likely to fear
Slater and Shield: found that identical twins more similar in phobias than non-identical ones.

Question 4

Evidence for nurture and phobias argument

Answer 4

Mineka et al- found that monkeys learn through social learning, monkeys and people similar, so it’s likely we learn fears as well
Watson and Rayner- shows environment can produce phobias, Albert was made afraid of a white rat