The nature-nurture debate is all about whether genetics (nature) or our environment (nurture) is responsible for our behaviour and development. Early theorists believed that our personality, intellect, behaviour and gender role were determined by our genes and therefore could not be changed. But an increasing amount of evidence has proved these theorists wrong, and our development as an individual is learnt through the environment we live in. One developmental stage of an individual that psychologists have the nature-nurture debate about is the intelligence stage. The nature side of that intelligence is present at birth and we already have a set amount of intelligence.
Whereas other theorists have argued that is is the way we are brought up and influenced by our surroundings that makes an individual the way they are. Nature means the genetic and biological influences that affect our growth and development. The nature side of the debate believes that it is inherited factors which have more impact on your life and development. For example, the colour or type of your hair, your eye colour, the pigmentation of your skin, and also genetic diseases such as cystic fibrosis are all the result of the genes we inherit. These biological factors are said to determine an individual’s development and characteristics .
Characteristics are features of an individual which separates people’s differences by the way they behave, their appearance, emotions and the way they think. Personality is the distinctive behavioural qualities of a person. Nature-nurture has been on hard core debate since the early ages. This debate is all about whether the genes or the environment matters more on people’s development. Nature in terms of health and social care defines as the qualities we are born with that makes us what we are.
The nature or nurture debate is concerned the with the contributions of genetic inheritance, and environmental factors to human development. The nature theory says, although traits such as as eye and hair colour and genetics diseases are determined by genes, that there are also different qualities, for example, Intelligence, Personality, Homosexuality. Some others would say that, we learn or discovers all them above. We learn and improve our intelligences, we probably inherit certain personality traits from the things/people around us and some people may be curious of their preferences,
This side of the nature-nurture debate suggests that we are a certain way because of the way we were bought up and our life experiences. Biological programming - this comes down to your genes. Biological programming suggests that you will have similar medical conditions to your parents supporting the idea of natural selection and genetics. Maturation theory - this theory sees child development as being controlled by evolution and that genetically there is a series of events that will occur automatically. It is believed the development has a biological process and this can be predicted over time.
The debate over nature versus nurture has been argued since the early years of psychology, perhaps even earlier when Aristotle proposed that humans have “four different types of causation, formal causes, material causes, efficient causes, and final causes,” (Moore, 21) that can explain the adaptation of certain characteristics in individuals over time . Psychologists today are still debating whether human behavioral traits are acquired through learning (Nurture) or if we have a predisposition to behave a certain way because of genetics (Nature). The nature versus nurture debate has since been branched off into many other psychological aspects of human characteristics. Traits such as intelligence, athleticism, and even our own individual personalities are just some of the topics researched by psychologist. So are our behavioral traits and characteristics learned and capable of change?
Nature vs. Nurture Scientists believe that traits such as hair and eye colour are determined by specific genes encoded in each human cell. They now also believe abstract traits such as intelligence, personality, aggression and sexual orientation are also encoded in an individual’s DNA. This is known as the Nature theory, whereby it is the genetics and the characteristics that have been inherited from generations earlier that make the person behave the way they are. The Nurture theory however has a different approach to human behaviour, and although it does not completely discount genetic tendencies, the scientists studying this theory ultimately believe that genetics do not matter. They argue that our behavioural aspects originate only from the environmental factors of our upbringing.
The biosocial theory. The term ‘culture’ encompasses the knowledge, beliefs and values shared by a society that are passed down the generations through imitation and communication. By looking at research through a variation of different cultures we can distinguish between universal features, which suggest an innate basis for gender therefore supporting the nurture side of the argument, and culturally specific features, which suggest gender is learned and so support the nurture side of the argument. A famous piece of cross cultural research on gender was the Six Cultures Study by Whiting and Whiting (1975) studied child rearing processes in North America, the Philippines, India, Mexico, Kenya and Japan. Researchers integrated themselves into the societies and conducted systematic 5 minute observations of the children’s daily lives.
Essay: describe and explain (from the video) how nature (inherited instinct biology/genes) and nurture (environment or upbringing (how are you treated/taught)) can affect a child’s development. In order to answer the focus question, we would need to understand the terms used. Nature describes the basic skills that are “hardwired” into our brains such as what a baby can do when it is born. A deeper understanding of the term would lead to a debate on the theory of evolution as, if a creature could be born knowing certain things such as speech already without being taught, that would have to be a form of evolution and then nurture would become nature. The term nurture refers to the way a child or adult was raised and the effect it had on their personality, such as a person’s language.
Nature vs. Nurture Over the years, there has been a lot of controversy on whether or not genes that we inherit affect us and how we live, or if it is the environment that we have been raised in. There are many different reasons for why one is more correct than that other. But, all of the reasons can be backed up with very good evidence and reasoning. Personality, development, intelligence, behavior and ability to do certain things make us the individuals that we are. But what influences those things?