Nature And Nurture In Early Child Development

Once a child is born and their development continues, then starts the controversy and wonder as to whether how the child is raised effects their outcome in adult hood, or whether they are just born to be a certain way. Child psychology looks into the many different factors that affect the pregnancy and raising a child. Such as, parenting styles, and how the environment (nurture) and the genetics (nature) play an important role in the child’s development.

The terms “play”, “learn” and “teach” are commonly used in the early childhood sector. This essay attempts to define and interconnect these terms to produce a holistic understanding of how play can be used as a medium to help children learn.

The Developing Child tells the viewers a brief history of the Nature vs. Nurture debate. Jean-Jacques Rousseau stressed the nature side of our personalities, believing it is nature alone that makes us how we are. English physiologist, John Locke believed children start off as blank slates and that they are completely shaped by their environment and thus held to the nurture side of the debate. This video has much newer ideas and experiments than those of Rousseau’s and Locke’s and because of that their thesis is “while biological factors provide the capabilities, environmental factors see if they are reached”. Babies know and think much more than was previously thought. Babies can turn their eyes and heads immediately recognize mother’s voice,

Early childhood is one of the most critical developmental periods in a human’s lifespan. The child transitions from infancy and begins the essential changes needed before the next developmental period begins, middle childhood which begins at six years of age. Development refers to “the orderly patterns of change, as well as continuities that occur in an individual through their life span” (text, p3). Human development is determined by both genes and environmental influences or nature and nurture. Nature refers to heredity which is the passing of traits from parents to their children and maturation which is the changes biologically programmed by genes (text, p7). Nurture refers to the changes that occur due to the individual’s environment

Nurture involves the effects of the environment

The old and popular debate between ‘nature vs. nurture’ has generated a lot of interest in newborns, who were previously thought to be ‘blank slates’, and has contributed a lot to developmental psychology, a field of psychology focusing on studying infants. It is now generally accepted that both nature and nurture make equal contribution to the infant’s development.

Throughout history, studies have shown that who you become later in life is determined at birth, that one’s genes solely influence who they grow up to be. To some extend this may be true however, new research concluded that the environment and experiences someone experiences as a child can be just as influential as genetic makeup. These studies have led to the Nature verses Nurture debate, with the nature side being one’s heredities and the nurture side, childhood experiences and relationships. This controversy has largely impacted the criminal world, as law enforcement tries to understand why some people commit horrendous acts. Nature vs. Nurture specifically comes into play when trying to understand the psychology of a serial killer, as

The ability to think is what distinguishes humans from other living beings. A human’s capacity to create, plan, organize, distinguish, use judgement, imagine, and speak are all elements of thinking. Cognitive development explains the progression of thinking, specifically critical thinking, throughout the lifespan. During childhood, the brain, particularly the areas of the brain that control cognition, are bursting with connections and changing continuously. Between childhood and adolescence, the capacity to think develops enormously and changes drastically.

In 1963 serial killer hunted and murdered 27 people , dismembered the bodies and dumped them all over the state of California. At his trial his defense lawyer said his defense was that he was born this way. Nature vs Nurture is a debate that has been around for years. It is an argument on whether people’s personalities and actions are the way they are because they were born that way or that’s how they were raised. So this means people are either a product of their environment. Or their traits were passed down genetically. Nature vs Nurture is a direct correlation with child development.

This report is based upon the book Nurture the Nature: Understanding and Supporting Your Child’s Unique Core Personality, written by Michael Gurian. This book is published by Jossey-Bass an imprint of John Wiley & Sons Publishers and is copyrighted 2007 by Michael Gurian. This book is filled with 370 pages of information on child development and issues parents and children face throughout the process.

The word Nurture is attributed to the environmental factors that influence who we are. Nurture also refers to the forces such as societal, cultural, and interpersonal that influence our growth and behavior. These include childhood experiences, social relationships, how the child was raised, and the surrounding culture.

Healthy child development is dependent on many factors, one of which is nurturing care. Nurturing care has seven components according to Alderman & Fernald, 2017, the components are protection from harm, stable home environment, access to good nutrition, responsive caregiving, quality health care provided, stimulating/enriching environment, and opportunity for play and exploration. By focusing on nurturing care is to support the brain’s response to early experiences in early childhood that will benefit “acquisition of languages, cognitive skills, and socio-emotional competencies” (Britto et al., 2017). In addition, supportive nurturing in early childhood development (ECD) can have lifelong benefits such as better learning capacity, greater opportunities for achievements, more involvement in community affairs and becoming a productive member of society.

When it comes to child development ,many questions are thought upon and several theories are put into play.Have you ever wondered why children do the things they do? Have you ever wondered why they act the way they do? Is it because of that child's lack of sensitivity? Or is it simply because of how he or she was treated? Well, the theory behind nature vs. nurture and their effect on children answers these questions and much more. But, the real question is between nature and nurture, which one has a bigger impact on children? Nature is believed to be "hereditary traits found in our genes that make us who we are." Nurture is "the sum of environmental factors influencing behavior and traits expressed by the organism." Nurture and nature has

It has been a very heated debate as to whether nature or nurture has a greater effect on the development of children. I believe that a nurturing environment has a stronger influence on a child’s personality than the role of nature. This class has provided me with more support and in agreement with my claim and it has given me a new perspective as to which parenting class I will use when I have my own family.

Human development is a very complex process – from conception to death. There has been a long debate on whether human development is determined by nature or nurture. If their growths were all guided by nature only, they would all be born with a mind of “blank slate”. This means that they do not have any inborn ability to do anything when they are born. On the other hand, if their growth was determined by nurture only, it would mean that they were fully equipped with all the skills they need in their lives when we are born. In other words, all the physical and mental skills they have right now would have been inherited from their parents and the environment they grow up in has no effect. This essay will focus on the effects of both