The Nature Theory - Heredity

Scientists have known for years that traits such as eye color and hair color are determined by specific genes encoded in each human cell. The Nature Theory takes things a step further to say that more abstract traits such as intelligence, personality, aggression, and sexual orientation are also encoded in an individual's DNA. The search for "behavioral" genes is the source of constant debate. Many fear that genetic arguments might be used to excuse criminal acts or justify divorce. The most debated issue pertaining to the nature theory is the exsistence of a "gay gene," pointing to a genetic component to sexual orientation. An April, 1998 article in LIFE Magazine, "Were You Born That Way" by George Howe Colt, claimed that "new studies show it's mostly in your genes." If genetics didn't play a part, then fraternal twins, reared under the same conditions, would be alike, regardless of differences in their genes. But, while studies show they do more closely resemble each other than do non-twin brothers and sisters, they also show these same striking similarities when reared apart - as in similar studies done with identical twins.

The nature versus nurture debate is about the relative importance of an individual's innate qualities ("nature", i.e.nativism, or philosophical empiricism, innatism) versus personal experiences ("nurture") in determining individual differences in physical and behavioral traits. The philosophy that humans acquire all or most of their behavioral traits from "nurture" is known as tabula rasa ("blank slate"). In recent years, both types of factors have come to be recognized as playing interacting roles in development. So several modern psychologists consider the question naive - representing an outdated state of knowledge. The famous psychologist Donald Hebb is said to have once answered a journalist's question of "which, nature or nurture, contributes more to personality?" by asking in response, "which contributes more to the area of a rectangle, its length or its width?".

Comparison chart Nature What is it?: In the "nature vs nurture" debate, nature refers to an individual's innate qualities (nativism or innatism). Nurture In the "nature vs nurture" debate, nurture refers to personal experiences (i.e. empiricism or behaviorism). Nurture refers to your childhood, or how you were brought up. Someone could be born with genes to give them a normal height, but be malnourished in childhood, resulting in stunted growth and a failure to develop as expected.

Example:

Nature is your genes. The physicaland personality traits determined by your genes stay the same irrespective of where you were born and raised.

Nature Factors: Nature factors that trigger an individual to commit crime are influences by biological and family factors.

Nurture Nurture factors that trigger an individual to commit crime are influences by social and environtment factors

Nature vs nurture in the IQ debate

Evidence suggests that family environmental factors may have an effect upon childhood IQ, accounting for up to a quarter of the variance. On the other hand, by late adolescence this correlation disappears, such that adoptive siblings are no more similar in IQ than strangers. Moreover, adoption studies indicate that, by adulthood, adoptive siblings are no more similar in IQ than strangers (IQ correlation near zero), while full siblings show an IQ correlation of 0.6. Twin studies reinforce this pattern: monozygotic (identical) twins raised separately are highly similar in IQ (0.86), more so than dizygotic (fraternal) twins raised together (0.6) and much more than adoptive siblings (almost 0.0). Consequently, in the context of the "nature versus nurture" debate, the "nature" component appears to be much more important than the "nurture" component in explaining IQ variance in the general adult population of theUnited States.
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Nature vs nurture in personality traits

Personality is a frequently cited example of a heritable trait that has been studied in twins and adoptions. Identical twins reared apart are far more similar in personality than randomly selected pairs of people. Likewise, identical twins are more similar than fraternal twins. Also, biological siblings are more similar in personality than adoptive siblings. Each observation suggests that personality is heritable to a certain extent. However, these same study designs allow for the examination of environment as well as genes. Adoption studies also directly measure the strength of shared family effects. Adopted siblings share only family environment. Unexpectedly, some adoption studies indicate that by adulthood the personalities of adopted siblings are no more similar than random pairs of strangers. This would

mean that shared family effects on personality are zero by adulthood. As is the case with personality, non-shared environmental effects are often found to out-weigh shared environmental effects. That is, environmental effects that are typically thought to be life-shaping (such as family life) may have less of an impact than non-shared effects, which are harder to identify. One possible source of non-shared effects is the environment of prenatal development. Random variations in the genetic program of development may be a substantial source of non-shared environment. These results suggest that "nurture" may not be the predominant factor in "environment".
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Moral considerations of the nature nurture

debate
Some observers offer the criticism that modern science tends to give too much weight to the nature side of the argument, in part because of the potential harm that has come from rationalized racism. Historically, much of this debate has had undertones of racist and eugenicist policies the notion of race as a scientific truth has often been assumed as a prerequisite in various incarnations of the nature versus nurture debate. In the past, heredity was often used as "scientific" justification for various forms of discrimination and oppression along racial and class lines. Works published in the United States since the 1960s that argue for the primacy of "nature" over "nurture" in determining certain characteristics, such as The Bell Curve, have been greeted with considerable controversy and scorn. A critique of moral arguments against the nature side of the argument could be that they cross the is-ought gap. That is, they apply values to facts. However, such appliance appears to construct reality. Belief in biologically determined stereotypes and abilities has been shown to increase the kind of behavior that is associated with such stereotypes and to impair intellectual performance through, among other things, the stereotype threat phenomenon. The implications of this are brilliantly illustrated by the implicit association tests (IATs) out of Harvard. These, along with studies of the impact of self-identification with either positive or negative stereotypes and therefore "priming" good or bad effects, show that stereotypes, regardless of their broad statistical significance, bias the judgements and behaviours of members and non-members of the stereotyped groups.
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Philosophical considerations of the nature

Are the traits real?

vs nurture debate
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It is sometimes a question whether the "trait" being measured is even a real thing. Much energy has been devoted to calculating the heritability of intelligence (usually the I.Q., or intelligence quotient), but there is still some disagreement as to what exactly "intelligence" is.
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Determinism and Free will

If genes do contribute substantially to the development of personal characteristics such as intelligence and personality, then many wonder if this implies that genes determine who we

are. Biological determinism is the thesis that genes determine who we are. Few, if any, scientists would make such a claim; however, many are accused of doing so. Others have pointed out that the premise of the "nature versus nurture" debate seems to negate the significance of free will. More specifically, if all our traits are determined by our genes, by our environment, by chance, or by some combination of these acting together, then there seems to be little room for free will. This line of reasoning suggests that the "nature versus nurture" debate tends to exaggerate the degree to which individual human behavior can be predicted based on knowledge of genetics and the environment. Furthermore, in this line of reasoning, it should also be pointed out that biology may determine our abilities, but free will still determines what we do with our abilities.

Researchers from King's College London studied 45 childhood characteristics in 6,759

pairs of identical and non-identical twins across the UK, to determine whether their

genes or their environment was more important.

A new series of "nature-nurture" maps produced by the team revealed that some

areas are "environmental hotspots" for particular traits, but in other places the same

attribute is mainly governed by genetics.

For example, across most of the country 60 per cent of the variation in children's

behaviour at school - whether they were unruly or not - was down to their genes.

But in London environment played a greater role - possibly because wealth varies so

dramatically within communities, meaning twins growing up on the same street are more

likely to fall in with different groups of friends who could influence their behaviour.

Dr Oliver Davis, who led the Wellcome Trust-funded study, published in the Molecular

Psychiatry journal, said: "There are any number of environments that vary geographically in

the UK, from social environments like health care or education provision to physical

environments like altitude, the weather or pollution.

The message that these maps really drive home is that your genes arent your destiny. There

are plenty of things that can affect how your particular human genome expresses itself, and

one of those things is where you grow up."

Nature, nurture... or neither? Epigenetics is the new twist in an age-old argument

It is a shibboleth of family life that every individual is the product of their genes and environment, the one an immutable inheritance, the other a mutable array of influences and pressures with unpredictable outcomes.

But new research has demonstrated that genes can change, identical twins with the same genetic inheritance can turn out completely different and the impact of environmental influences can be passed down the generations.

The new science of epigenetics has shown that in addition to nature and nurture, what makes us who we are is also determined by biological mechanisms that can switch genes on or off.

These epigenetic (above the gene) "light switches" can affect characteristics as fundamental as autism and sexual orientation.

But they are also subject to environmental influences and thus, in theory, are within our control.

Professor Tim Spector, head of the department of twin research at Kings College, London, who has undertaken the most detailed twin studies in the world, cited the case of Iranian twins Ladan and Laleh, who were joined at the head and shared identical genes and environment and yet had different personalities. The differences led him to question the influence of genes.

"Up to a few years ago I believed genes were the key to the universe. But over the last three years, I have changed my mind," he said at the launch of his book Identically Different: Why You Can Change Your Genes, which challenges the view that an individual's genetic inheritance is immutable.

Studies of the effects of famines in Holland in the 1940s, in China in the 1950s and in the United States over a century ago show they changed the lifespan and obesity rates in subsequent generations. They switched on genes that increased the accumulation of body fat in times of plenty, in order to improve survival chances in times of famine.

In the modern world, with calorie-dense fast foods more freely available than at any time in history, the seeds of the current obesity epidemic may thus have been sown in the 19th century.

"The risk of obesity can come not just from your own environment or your mother's but higher up [the ancestral chain]," he said.

Four drugs with epigenetic effects that can switch genes on or off are already on the market and 40 more are in development, he said.

But there are other, natural, ways of controlling them, too. Exercise has been shown to switch off the FTO gene, a key driver of obesity. Diet can also affect gene expression.

"We and our genes are more flexible than we thought," he said.