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Nature vs nurture child development
Nature vs nurture child development
Environmental influences child development
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Children are like fingerprints, not one is the same as another. Appearance, personality, and the pace at which we develop are unique to each person. Although individuality is celebrated, new parents are often eager to pick out characteristics of their children that are similar to their own. They may notice their infant has the same vibrant, red hair as his mother or loves reading as much as his father. Such similarities and differences between a parent and a child can be caused by a variety of reasons. In this paper I will explore two broad categories, environmental factors and inherited characteristics, as the basis of these characteristic variations. Carson had a normal, natural birth with a labor time of about ten hours. He was generally a content and relaxed baby, regular in his sleeping and eating habits. As toddlerhood approached, Carson was eager to explore his surroundings but showed a distinct attachment to me. As he grew older, it became easier to pinpoint some behaviors and traits that resembled my own, as well as some that were unlike me. To begin, one of the traits Carson displayed that approximated my own was his temperament. When surveyed about my personality inventory, I indicated that I was essentially an easy-going person, able to stay on task and follow the rules, exhibit appropriate emotions, and adjust to novel situations fairly easily. Likewise, Carson followed similar patterns of temperament. According to researchers, three main personality types emerge in childhood; resilient, overcontrolled, and under controlled children (Asendorpf, Borkenau, Ostendorf, Van Aken, 2001). Carson presented behaviors that were all indicative of the resilient child—well-adjusted, able to regulate emotions, ... ... middle of paper ... ...98). Role of Cognitively Stimulating Home Environment in Children's Academic Intrinsic Motivation: A Longitudinal Study. Child Development, 69(5), 1448-1460. Hoekstra, R. A., Bartels, M., van Leeuwen, M., & Boomsma, D. I. (2009). Genetic architecture of verbal abilities in children and adolescents. Developmental Science, 12(6), 1041-1053. doi:10.1111/j.1467-7687.2009.00843.x Jones, P. A. (1972). Home Environment And The Development Of Verbal Ability. Child Development, 43(3), 1081-1086. doi:10.1111/1467-8624.ep12114677 Oliver , K. (2002 , May). Understanding your child's temperament. Retrieved from http://ohioline.osu.edu/flm02/FS05.html Price, T. S., & Jaffee, S. R. (2008). Effects of the family environment: Gene-environment interaction and passive gene-environment correlation. Developmental Psychology, 44(2), 305-315. doi:10.1037/0012-1649.44.2.305
“The term “nature versus nurture” is used to refer to a long-running scientific debate. The source of debate is the question of which has a greater influence on development: someone's innate characteristics provided by genetics, or someone's environment. In fact, the nature versus nurture debate has been largely termed obsolete by many researchers, because both innate characteristics and environment play a huge role in development, and they often intersect”. (Smith, 2010 p. 1)
In a study done on the genetic and environmental factors influencing the emergence of these traits it was shown that both of these play large factors. The researchers studied one hundred and twenty-three pairs of identical twins and one hundred and twenty-seven pairs of fraternal
A layman would define personality as an individual’s characteristics in terms of how they think and behave. Many theorists, however, interprets personality differently resulting in various personality theories. Personality is determined by traits which are behaviours displayed by a person in most given situations. How a person reacts to common circumstances may also be used to foresee future behaviours. Traits are then categorized into types that allow easier comparisons to be made between each individual’s attributes. The focus of this paper would be on the biological aspects of personality whereby traits are thought to be inheritable through genetics and associated with the central nervous system. Behavioural genetics are research that makes use of results from studies done on family, twins and adoptions. The findings of how both genes and environment influences personality from the studies will be discussed. Some researchers found possible issues with the representativeness of such studies. The outline of Eysenck’s biological model of personality and arousal, Gray’s BAS/BIS theory and Cloninger’s biological model of personality will further explain the biological effect on personality.
children’s personality, character, and competence” (Baumrind, 1978). It is amazing that children who are raised in completely different environments can go on to possess similar characteristics later in life. But why is this the case? The functions that parents perform greatly influence how children develop. A tremendous amount of research has been done on the effects of parenting styles since 1966 when Diana Baumrind first published her three prototypes of parenting styles, but many parents fail to understand the power they possess in shaping the future lives of their children and the need for a responsible strategy regarding the rearing of their children.
The idea of shared environmental aspects meaning that the parents behave the same way with all their children, and that any consequences of being around those parents will have an effect of making two twins more similar to each other. An example of non-shared environmental factors discussed is peer relationships. Since each individual in a twin pair is likely to form different friendships outside of the home, the consequences of associating with different peers can contribute to observed differences between twins (Andershed). After the contribution of genetic factors was accounted for in the study, the role of environmental effects was examined. Findings showed that the contribution of non-shared environmental effects was fairly large, while shared environmental effects were negligible.
The classic debated topic of Nature versus Nurture has been and will always be a quarrelsome subject in the scientific world. Meaning, the issue of the level to which environment and heredity sway behavior and development in a person. Nature can be defined as, behaviors due to heredity. This means the behaviors is based on the inherited makeup of an individual and is an influence of the growth and development of that individuals’ all through life. On the other hand nurture is causes of behaviors that are environmental. This Intel’s the influence is from the individual’s parents, siblings, family, friends and all other experiences that individual exposed to during life. However, these concept of ideas supports the inborn genetic framework, inherited from our parents, is the sole influential factor in our behavioral characteristics. These two conflicting viewpoints have created a whole host of thoughts, assumptions, and opinion in psychology. For the reason, the distinction between nature and nurture are not enough to put one overlapping the other.
Mrs. Sargent mentioned that a child’s strongest traits are often the ones that their parents are trying to subdue. In this chapter Mrs. Sargent provides a list of the Temperament ABCs, this is a list of all different personality types noted in alphabetical order. From this she encourages the reader to pick the first temperaments that align with their child. These are their strongest inborn traits! These traits will influence that child throughout life; 1) how he relates to others, 2) how he deals with issues, 3) how he accomplishes tasks, and 4) what excites and drives him. Mrs. Sargent stated, “becoming familiar with your child’s personality will go a long way toward helping you understand why your child acts the way she does”, and I believe that this is one of the most important statements within the book. She also cautions not to stereotype a child based on their personality traits, no one person is the same as another. When her children were young she read a book to them called The Treasure Tree, in this book the four characters all had a different temperament that was known. These temperaments shown were the very personality types that Hippocrates’ laid the foundation for several hundred years ago; Choleric, Sanguine, Melancholy, and Phlegmatic. From this there is a quiz that helps to identify what personality type best fits a child. But she also explains that people will never fit into one type completely. That it is extremely likely to place in two or three categories, with one possibly out ranking the others. The very personalities that we have play a greater influence on the life we live than our intellectual
It can be said for most parents that they want their children to grow up to be successful contributing members of society. Being a parent is a difficult, yet rewarding task. But why do some types of parenting result in juvenile delinquency while others find success. There are four generally recognized parenting styles and are categorized: authoritarian, permissive, neglectful, and authoritative. This essay will break down the various styles, its type(s) of discipline and effectiveness.
Diana Baurmind and Alfred Adler have similar categories of parenting styles. Authoritative parenting can be compared to democratic and encouraging. Both of these styles offer love and security of the child. They express the parent is in control, but the parent also respect their child with explaining parental actions in a positive way. Permissive parenting can be compared to over-submissive parenting style. The child is rude, and demanding. The parent usually accepts the child’s behavior. In my opinion, the parent does not want to upset the child, or bother with correcting the behavior, so they will give in by rewarding the child in order to correct the child’s behavior. Authoritarian parenting can be compared to over-coercive parenting. These parents are very strict with children. My father can be compared to this parenting style. There was no reasoning, no communication, and his actions were final. This kind of parenting reminds me of being in the military. Finally, uninvolved parenting can be compared to neglecting parenting. I almost wanted to compare uninvolved to rejecting, but I cannot necessarily say the parent has denied acceptance. The parent is selfish, and does not even provide the bare minimum for their child’s necessities. I can compare this type of parenting from a 16 year old mother from the show Teen Mom’s. Jenelle had her son Andrew at a very young age. After his birth, she was distance and cared more about partying. Her
He usually felt lonely, however in his behavior he tries to act strong and bold to gain attention from others. In one study, a psychologist named John Watson shaped a newborn into environmental factors he chose. This research came out successful. The development of children mostly depends on the environment their parents create. Then the children catch onto the behavior of that environment, which is the character parents emits
Every parent has different skills that they use when dealing with their child. Growing up I had two parents with completely different techniques on how to handle situations with me. Both of my parents love me unconditionally, and would give me the entire world if they could. For every parent, teaching lessons and earning respect is a very important aspect to them. Each of my parents love me so much, but both have very different ways of showing affection, discipline, and communication.
Child growth and development is a process that consists of some building blocks, which are components that combine in an infinite number of ways (Cherry, n.d.). As a result of the variations of building blocks in a child’s development, educators, psychologists, and philosophers have been constantly engaged in the debate of nature versus nurture debate. Many researchers agree that child development is a complex interaction between his/her genetic background (nature) and his/her environment (nurture). In essence, some developmental aspects are strongly affected by biology whereas other aspects are influenced by environmental factors. From the onset of an individu...
In particular, the integration of passive and evocative genotypes along with environmental impacts had a significant effect on the way I raised my child, as well as the child’s response to my parenting practices. Passive genotypes are based on the concept that biological parents provide both genes and specific environments for children that reinforce those genes (Arnett, 2016), making it impossible to separate the two into disparate influences. For example, my child had always been an avid reader and was considerably advanced in her language and socialization skills, which as a characteristic, was likely inherited from me. This genetic inclination toward reading was then reinforced and strengthened by an environment that I had indirectly provided that included a large aspect of literature and an extensive use of language. An evocative genotype as described by Arnett (2016), occurs when the child has acquired a particular skillset or characteristic, which in turn evokes a particular response in the parent. As my virtual child began demonstrating strength in athletics, and was acquiring skills such as obedience and cooperation through her sports teams, my response as a parent was to encourage this behavior, and provide an environment with easy accessibility to physical activity and sports. This in turn had a significant effect on the amount of socialization my child was exposed to, and influenced my child to later become more concerned with the interests and opinions of others, along with her social status as compared with her
Parents and their parenting style play an important role in the development of their child. In fact, many child experts suggest that parenting style can affect a child’s social, cognitive, and psychological development which influence not just their childhood years, but it will also extend throughout their adult life. This is because a child’s development takes place through a number of stimuli, interaction, and exchanges that surround him or her. And since parents are generally a fixed presence in a child’s life, they will likely have a significant part on the child’s positive or negative development (Gur 25).
Everyone has a mom and a dad, however some people only live with one of the parent. Some parents are single parent or some have remarried to a different person, thus giving the child a step parent. If the step parent is up for the challenge and parents correctly they can easily just become a motherly or fatherly figure instead of the step mom or step dad. Regardless, there are many differences between a mom and dad. They typically have different ideas on parenting styles, different attitudes towards certain experiences or ideas, etc. They are almost never completely on the same page, but if they are it is very well known it took quite some time to get there together.