Nature-nurture debate

Question 1

What is the nature-nurture debate?

Answer 1

• concerned with the extent to which aspects of behaviour are a product of inherited or acquired characteristics and also how they interact with each other > an interactionist approach

Question 2

Why is it not a debate about one or the other?

Answer 2

• because any behaviour/ characteristic arises from a combination of both e.g.
• Bowlby > baby’s attachment type is determined by the warmth & continuity of parental love (environmental influence)
• Kagan > baby’s innate personality (temperament) also affects attachment relationship
  nature creates nurture =interaction

Question 3

How is the diathesis stress model an example of an interactionist theory?

Answer 3

• it suggests behaviour is caused by biological or environmental vulnerability (diathesis)
  which is only expressed when coupled with a biological or environmental ‘trigger’ (stressor)
  e.g. a person with a genetic vulnerability for OCD may not develop disorder> combined with a trigger (traumatic experience) may result in the disorder

Question 4

What is epigenetics?

Answer 4

• refers to a change in our genetic activity without changing the genes themselves
• caused by interaction with the environment

Question 5

How does epigenetics occur and what does this lead to?

Answer 5

• lifestyles or events e.g. smoking, diet, trauma leave ‘marks’ on our DNA which switch genes on and off
• this changes the way genes are expressed and influences genetic codes of children and their children

Question 6

What is nurture?

Answer 6

• refers to inherited influences or heredity

Question 7

What did early nativists argue?

Answer 7

• Descartes argued that all human characteristics and even some aspects of knowledge are innate
• psychological characteristics like intelligence or personality are determined by biological factors (genes) just as physical characteristics are

Question 8

What is nurture?

Answer 8

• nurture refers to the influence of experience and the environment

Question 9

What did Lerner identify?

Answer 9

• different levels of the environment
• prenatal factors, e.g. how physical influences (smoking) or psychological influences (music) affect a foetus
• postnatal factors influence development e.g. social condition child grows up in

Question 10

What do empiricists argues?

Answer 10

• John Locke argued that the mind is a blank state at birth ( tabula rasa) which is then shaped by the environment
  -important feature of behaviourist approach

Question 11

How is nature and nurture measured?

Answer 11

• the degree to which two people are similar on a particular trait can be represented by a correlation coefficient and is called concordance
• concordance rates provide estimates about the extent to which a traits inherited - heritability

Question 12

• What is heritability?

Answer 12

• this measures the proportion of differences between individuals in a population, with regards to a particular trait that is due to genetic variation

Question 13

What does a figure of .01 and 1.0 mean?

Answer 13

.01 (1%) - means genes contribute almost nothing to individual differences
1.0 (100%)- means genes are the only reason for individual differences
- IQ is 0.5 across cultures

Question 14

What is a strength of research into the nature-nurture debate?

Answer 14

• use of adoption studies > they separate the competing influences of nature & nurture
• if adopted children are found to be more similar to their adoptive parents- suggests environment is the bigger influence
• if adopted children more similar to bio parents > genetics factors presumed to dominate
• e.g. a meta- analysis of adoption studies by Rhee & Waldman > found that genetic influences accounted for 41% of the variance in aggression
• showing how research can separate the influences of nature & nurture

Question 15

What is a counterpoint to the first strength of the debate?

Answer 15

• However, research suggests that this approach may be misguided
• nature and nurture are not two entities that can simply be pulled apart According to Plomin > people create their own ‘nurture’ by actively selecting environments that are appropriate for their nature
• e.g. a naturally aggressive child is likely to feel more comfortable with children who show similar behaviours and will choose their environment accordingly > Then, their chosen companions further influence their development
• refers to this as niche-picking
• This suggests that it does not make sense to look at evidence of either nature or nurture separately

Question 16

What is another strength of nature- nurture debate?

Answer 16

• support for epigenetics
• example of how environmental affects can span generations through epigenetic effects comes from WW2
• 1944 Nazis blocked distribution of food to Dutch people, 22,000 died of starvation - Dutch hunger winter
• Susser & Lin > women who became pregnant during famine went on to have low weight babies
• theses babies were twice as likely to develop schizophrenia when they grew up compared to more typical rates
• supports that life experiences of previous generations can leave epigenetic markers that influence health of offspring

Question 17

How does the nature-nurture debate have real-life application?

Answer 17

• research suggests OCD is a highly heritable disorder e.g. Nestadt et al put the heritability rate at .76
• understanding can inform genetic counselling > important to understand that high heritability does not mean it is inevitable individual will develop disorder
• people with high genetic risk of OCD can receive advice about the likelihood of developing the disorder (prevention)
• debate is important on a practical level