Nature vs Nurture Essay

Throughout the history of human existence, there have always been many questions that have plagued man for centuries. Some of these questions are “what is the meaning of life” or “which came first, the chicken or the egg.” Within the last 400 years a new question has surfaced and has caused an enormous controversy which takes our minds to much further levels. The controversy is whether inherited genes or the environment influences and affects our personality, intelligence, behavior, development and abilities. This controversy is most often recognized as the “Nature vs. Nurture” conflict. Some people believe that it is strictly genes that affect our ways of live and how we are, while others believe that it is the environment that affects

Intelligence is defined as the ability to learn from experience, solve problems, and use knowledge to adapt to new situations. We can measure a person’s intelligence by assessing an individual’s mental aptitudes using numerical scores. Psychologists are currently still arguing whether intelligence is inherited or acquired. Nature is focuses more on genetics and hormones while. Nurture, on the other hand, focuses on external factors that have an influence on individuals. Regarding the intelligence debate in Psychology, the most important factor is nurture/environment.

One of the most enduring debates in the field of psychology is the controversial idea of nature vs. nurture. Throughout the endless history of the debate, no clear conclusion has been met, only hypotheses have been formed. At the center of the debate, human behaviors, ideas, and feelings are being determined, whether they are learned or inherited. Determining physical traits, such as eye color or hair color, are simple because they are hereditary traits. The idea of having a certain personality, intelligence, or ability is under discussion because scientists cannot determine if these traits are learned, or predetermined by genes.

The biological approach in psychology states that behaviour is determined by a genetic component which results in a particular trait or behaviour. A topic area within psychology where this can be investigated is the heritability of IQ, it is suggested that genetic influence is the only factor to consider when investigating IQ, however others have suggested that other factors may play a role in determining IQ.

Q) What was the basis of doctors reasoning to raise David (named Bruce at birth) as a girl? Explain the doctors reasoning in relation to nature versus nurture theories.

In today's society, one will find that there are many different factors that go into the development of a criminal mind, and it is impossible to single out one particular cause of criminal behavior. Criminal behavior often stems from both biological and environmental factors. In many cases criminals share similar physical traits which the general population do not usually have. For example criminals have smaller brains than properly adjusted individuals. However biological reasons cannot solely be the cause of criminal behavior. Therefore, one must look to other sources as to how a criminal mind is developed. Social and environmental factors also are at fault for developing

From Dr. Money’s perspective, raising Bruce as a girl would allow him to live a “normal” life, if he were to live his life without a penis, he would be seen as an outsider and rejected from society. He also suggested to put Bruce on estrogen, but also surgically give him a cosmetic vagina. Dr. Money explained to Ron and Janet that Bruce/Brenda, would psychologically mature as a woman, and be attracted to men, as well as be able to have sexual intecourse, without a problem. According to Bruce’s parents, there was no reason “that it shouldn’t work” (50). However, they could have thought it out thoroughly, what if Brenda didn’t feel comfortable in her own skin? Would she feel as though something is wrong with her? This is where the topic of

Numerous people, like Galton, have tried to find where these two terms separate in their means of influence, whereas for others “who used the terms, nurture was rarely, if ever, seen as separable from nature; instead, it was referred to as helping and assisting, or as responding to, nature; nurture was more of a verb than a noun.” (Plonka, 2016) Similar to many things in the world, ideas that state that something works solely by itself is harder to believe than if it were to work with another component of the world around it. Those who believe that nature and nurture work together in sync to influence an organism believe that they show “a crucial biological phenomenon of mutual influences of both hereditary and environmental factors in the trait formation.” (Plonka, 2016) Nature alone cannot determine a person alone, yet nurture only has limited influence as

with the same genetic make-up. The results are not conclusive, although it is found that the

In my opinion, It seems that this battle between nature and nurture will go on forever because both sides can be easily backed up with supporting information as to which is more important. Plus we receive genes from our family, but our environment and nurturing can alter that if strong enough, as an influence. Whether we notice it or not, nature and nurture are mixed in with each other, influencing traits of everyone. Overall, my personal thoughts about reading this article concluded two assumptions. The first assumptions about this article were that it was very influential and cover everything we’ve been discussing in class. For instance, nature and nurture and the different interactions effects. Not to mention, the social construction of the human brain and how it interacts between the organ system of the

The nature vs nurture debate is one that naturalists and empiricists love to have. The naturalists are on the nature side of the debate; they believe that a person's development is primarily influenced by their genetic traits. The empiricists, on the other hand, side with the nurture part of the debate; they believed that a person's development is mostly influenced by the environment they are raised in. Most modern psychologist, however, don’t take such radical approaches. They instead accept that a person’s development is influenced by a mixture of both nature and nurture, although there is still debate over which plays a larger role (McLeod). In my life, both nature and nurture have played key roles in my development as a person and who I

Although normal brain development can be retarded by sensory, social isolation, and deprivation, there is no sure environment that will transform a normal baby into a genius. Explain why heredity many contribute to individual differences in intelligence but not necessarily contributes to group differences. The amount of variation in a trait within a group that is attributed to genetic factors is called its heritability. For intelligence, this has been estimated at 50 percent. If we know a trait has perfect heritability, this knowledge does not enable us to rule out environmental factors in explaining differences between groups. Because of the impact of environmental factors such as education and nutrition on intelligence test performance, even if the heritability of intelligence is high within a particular group, differences in intelligence among groups may be environmentally caused. One group may, for example, thrive in an enriched environment while another of the same genetic predisposition may falter in an impoverished

‘Nature v. Nurture’ is the psychological term that questions whether genetic factors or environmental factors affect human psychological development more. This short essay will cover three main topics. What does ‘nature vs. nurture’ mean? The discussion of ‘nature vs. nurture’ classifications. Also, the controversy of ‘nature vs. nurture’.

About 20% of teens in the 21st century experience depression before reaching adulthood. Are these teens depressed because one or both of their parents had depression when they were teens, or is it because of their social environment? Traits such as eye color and weight have been scientifically proven to be caused because of genetics. What about mental disorders and an individual’s personality? That’s where the nature vs. nurture debate comes in.

While this assumption is accepted by a majority of geneticists and behavioral scientists, there is great disagreement on the degree of influence each contributes. Arguments for environmental influences are compelling; at the same time there is growing evidence that genetic influence on intelligence is significant and substantial (Eyesenck, 1998; Mackintosh, 1998; Plomin, 1994; Steen, 1996). The purpose of this paper is to explore the question: "How is intelligence influenced by heredity and environment?"