The Brain Storm Chapter 1 Summary

“When it comes to interpreting other people’s behavior, human beings invariable make the mistake of overestimating the importance of fundamental character traits and underestimating the importance of the situation and context. We will always reach for a “dispositional” explanation for events, as opposed to a contextual explanation”. (160) As mentioned before, just because someone comes from the slums, it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are more likely to be troubled or commit a crime than someone who comes from a well-kept upper class community. How these two people act, see, think, and feel come from all environments - ranging from home, to school, to after school activities, to where they hang out, to what they watch or listen to. These daily sights, sounds and interactions shape the person that they become. “Character isn’t what we think it is or, rather, what we want it to be. It isn’t a stable, easily identifiable set of closely related traits, and it only seems that way because of a glitch in the way our brains are organized. Character is more like a bundle of habits and tendencies and interests, loosely bound together and dependent, at certain times, on circumstance and context”. (163) So how much and to what extent does their environment dictate their behavior? “The features of our immediate social and physical world play a huge role in shaping who we are and how we act” (168) Whether consciously or subconsciously, willingly or unwillingly, the every day choices we make or don’t make help to shape our character and define our patterns of

He argues in the book that the human mind makes a difference between men and women, but they cannot be judged because of their genders and mental and physical abilities. Thought the thoughts of males and females are entirely different because of internal biological differences society and culture play a part in the standards these genders should conform to fit in. Socialization to gender roles impacts the shaping of the male and female minds in society, and this Pinker did not emphasize. Gender is defined as the socially constructed behavior, roles, attributes and activities that our societies consider appropriate for women and men. The development process that shapes the mind begins in life early and heightens during adolescence stage for instance; researchers discovered that gender expectation negatively influences psychosocial development of girls. Thus inferring the fact that men and females cannot be judged by their mental and physical abilities is true but minus the influence of influences of cultural and religious biases the male and females mind would not be that different.

Both normative and nonnormative influences and nature and nurture influences both shed light on human development over childhood and adolescence. The nature and nurture debate refers to whether particular aspects of development are a result of inherited characteristics (nature) or obtained characteristics (nurture). The answer to what characteristics were obtained by which source is a difficult task as there is still much to learn about the way genetic markers work and how their patterning influence organisms. Instead nature and nurture should be looked at as a intricate ecology (Claiborne, Drewery, Paki, & Peters, 2014). This is where characteristics are not considered to have only a single source but can linked to a contribution of our genetic

In her article “Sex Differences Are Not Hardwired,” Lesley Rogers claims that although genes do play a role when it comes to sex differences it is not the only factor that effects gender and it is impossible to not include interactive explanations when describing sex differences. The first topic is genetic determinist explanations for sex differences. In this section, Rogers discusses how popular media sources have now become involved in the conversation of genetic explanations for sex differences in behavior. The main message being spread throughout media is “genes cause behavior” and that it is “hardwired” in our brains at birth to be a certain way (28). Rogers emphasizes that this is not the case and that it’s more complexed, but this information

One of the oldest, most prominent topics of academic debate is the Nature vs. Nurture argument. Nature vs. Nurture is a largely psychological term, in which the Nature aspect places more significance on genetics and personality; our innate predisposition to various circumstances tell us a great deal more about who we are. On the other side, the Nurture aspect places more focus on our environment and stresses the salience of the majority of what we do in our daily lives have been “learned” We see a wide array of examples of this specific argument in literature, popular culture, and even in our everyday lives. While no one can deny that both sides have extremely valid points, it would be very naive to assume that one had more of a dominant factor;

How a physical process develops and how organs adjust to outside influences is determined by a child’s biology. For example, gender can affect development in various ways. Whether a child is a boy or girl can affect how they develop and learn. Research shows that boys have lower levels of school readiness than girls because boys tend to learn and develop differently from girls. Another determining factor on how gender affects development include stereotyping or abuse within the family. If those two factors are present, the experiences of a child could vary. Philosophers Piaget and Vygotsky discuss the importance of a developing child’s experience in their cognitive growth. For example, a girl born into a family that believes a woman’s only role is to be a housewife and raise children, may not be given the

The concept of nature vs nurture is easily one of the oldest and most controversial arguments of modern times. Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker is notably known in the world of psychology and the social sciences for his book “The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature.” In his book, Pinker addresses this exact argument and reasons that human behavior is mostly and at its roots is formed by evolutionary psychological adaptations. In 2003, Steven Pinker gave a Ted Talk regarding his book and the idea that human behavior is predisposed, rather than formed by socialization, interactions between people and the exposure to culture. Pinker discusses the reasoning behind his stance on nature over nurture using five key discussion points, these points being, human universals, neurology and DNA, political reasoning, the arts and parenting. During his Ted Talk, Pinker begins by stating that there are human universals, concepts, behaviors and traits that are carried and found, with many similarities, throughout every human civilization, he then explains that a common example of this is with twins separated at birth, and can be proven through neurological studies. Another concept that Pinker address to further solidify his stance is the idea that the argument that humans are ‘blank slates’ and human behavior is developed through nurture rather than nature is the political reasoning behind the benefits of everyone being ‘blank slates’. Two critical points he made however

Anthropologist Margaret Mead addressed the differences in temperament found between men and women in her book Sex and Temperament in Three Primitive Societies (1935). In this study she concluded that sex has no bearing on social traits and the temperament of an individual. Her research looked at whether masculine or feminine traits are innate or learned. She also questioned whether men and women differ because of nature (heredity) or nurture (socialization). She concludes that cultural conditioning is more important than biology in shaping the behavior of women and men. The observed differences in temperament between men and women are not a function of their biological differences. Rather, they result from differences in the socialization

Through Up Series, it could be observed how both biology and environment played a significant role in Andrew’s development. Behavior geneticist Sandra Scarr (1993) theorized three ways that heredity and environment can be correlated.

The development of human being during the entire course of life, focus on biological and psychological growth (Berk, 2010). Human development hold several outcomes that are altered by both positive and negative influences. Genetic (nature) and environmental (nurture) influences place significant impact on human development. In fact, Pinker (2004) submits that behavior is the result of a complex collaboration among inheritance and environmental factors in human development, ultimately supporting that nature-nurture work collectively (Pinker, 2004).

One of the oldest debates in the history of Psychology is about Nature versus Nurture. Today, we know that both play a significant role in human’s life. Some people believe that it is genes which affects our way of life and some people believes that it is none other but our environment that greatly influences our lifestyle and some believe that both has tremendous impact on one’s way of life. Indeed in certain cases both our nature (our genes) and our environment roughly play an equal role in human life.

For centuries, human’s behavior has been the center of attention not just for scientists, but also psychologist, scientist, and physiologies have always questioned what the root or main factor that contributes to a person's personality, sexuality; in other words, their entire behavior. Nature v.s. nurture has been one of the biggest debates that the scientific world has faced. Nature states that genes are responsible for human behavior, sexuality, and predisposition to certain diseases. On the other hand, nurture is defined as the theory that says all the contrary compared to nature. According to the nurture theory, the environment is the main factor that contributes to someone’s behavior, sexuality, and predisposition to diseases. This debate goes back to the era of the great philosopher Plato (428-348 B.C.E); who stated that temperament and intelligence are innate. Also, this debate has caused disagreement in two of the major psychologists known to mankind, Lev Vygotsky and Jean Piaget. The disagreement originated when Vygotsky stated that the cognitive development of a child is mainly influenced by

In trying to understand human behavior, professionals for centuries have looked at the nature vs. nurture theory. While it is known that the physical traits such of eye or hair color have to do with nature, some strongly believe that genes play a part in the way we behave such as in personality and intelligence and others believe that we behave a certain way solely due to our environment. Professor Jerome Kagan, from Harvard opened up a brand new world and offers a deeper understanding for the way we behave. He pointed out that two-year old Marjorie unlike other children her age started out shy, a tendency he believed she inherited and while it is true that Marjorie cannot change that she is a girl there are certain aspect of her make

Introduction As part of this assignment the writer will examine evidence that human behaviour is driven by our biology. It is important to consider social and cultural influences as evidence against the biological perspective in shaping human behaviour. It is well known that both biological and socio-cultural factors play a role in how humans behave so it is important to consider the interplay between both perspectives. This is what is known as The Nature vs Nurture debate in psychology and this is what the writer will focus on for the purpose of this assignment.

The question of whether we are more heavily influenced by our surroundings and/or our upbringing as opposed to what comes naturally to us is a very controversial ongoing debate. This examination can be seen in the 1965 experiment known as “The John/Joan Case”, intended to test the theory of “Nature vs Nurture”. This dispute within psychology is concerned with the extent to which particular aspects of behavior are a product of either inherited or acquired characteristics. “Nature is all that a man brings with himself into the world; nurture is every influence without that affects him after his birth.” (Galton)