Nature and Nurture, Not Nature Versus Nurture

The debate over the development of individual traits and behavioral characteristics has, at some point in some degree, been a focus of nearly every single academic discipline for the past few centuries. “Nature or nurture” has become a rallying cry for opposing schools of thought, and with the extraordinary technological advances in the sciences over the past few decades it seems opposing sides have only bolstered their individual arguments. Nature refers to biological, genetic inheritance. In regard to behavioral characteristics the debate centers on how much a person’s thoughts, actions, and personal interests can be attributed to genetic inheritance. Nurture refers to environmental, learned behavior that a person learns, or fails to learn, due to their immediate surroundings and upbringing.

The nature versus nurture debate is less fractured than the name implies. Indeed, the problem is more a debate over the quantification of blame that can be placed on nurture or nature. Take a quick example: a young boy gets caught by a security guard attempting to steal a chocolate bar from a grocery store candy aisle. The boy was raised in a single parent household as his father has been in prison for the majority of the boy’s life. Despite living in an impoverished, underdeveloped neighborhood, the mother works very hard to keep the boy in a private school, and the two attend church services two times each week. Certain academics may claim that the boy has a genetic disposition to specific personality disorders that he inherited from his father, and therefore he has a predilection to antisocial behavior in his own personal interest. Others may claim that the boys socioeconomic living standards have led him to criminal behavior due to the examples set forth in his immediate surroundings. The truth, however, is much more complicated than either of these arguments. Perhaps the boy does have a predilection to antisocial behavior, or his group of friends from the neighborhood considers stealing chocolate bars a significant level of social worth. Perhaps the boy was simply hungry and hadn’t yet developed a serious understanding of social moors. Either way, this example is made to show how complicated the nature versus nurture debate is. Stealing chocolate bars is an incredibly complex trait that certainly has many factors at play. Most of the nature versus nurture debate, today, centers on traits and characteristics that are much less complicated.

Temperaments are complex personality traits that has been the focus of many nature versus nurture studies. McCrae et al. found strong support for the social and conceptual link between childhood temperament and cultural norms of behavior (183). In this study the five-factor personality trait model was used to distinguish differing amounts of five characteristic personality traits in an individual’s overall personality. The five-factor model uses openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism to distinguish specific personality behaviors. Of the 5,085 subjects over the age of 14, McCrae et al. found that personalities were largely associated to cultural norms within the countries of interest: Germany, United Kingdom, Spain, Czech Republic, and Turkey. A limitation of this study, of course, is that while cultural pressures are very contemporary, national identity in the twenty-first century does not correlate very well to genetic commonalities.

Personality disorders can be attributed to similar factors of characteristics and traits. Kim-Cohen et al. found that there is a strong association between both nurture and nature in the development of antisocial personality disorder in children (177). The aim of their study was to quantify the genetic and learned components of childhood antisocial behavior. They utilized the E-Risk study in the United Kingdom in which 1,116 pairs of twins were assessed between the ages of 5-7 years and associated maternal depression with the occurrence of antisocial behavior during, or shortly after, this age range. They concluded that the 5-7 age range is an important time frame for the development of antisocial behavior if the mother experiences depression during this time (Kim-Cohen 179). They also concluded that studies focused on either end of the nature versus nurture spectrum are missing a large part of the picture.

As the summary of these two studies indicates, the nature versus nurture debate is very complex. Kim-Cohen et al considered genetic predisposition to antisocial behavior, however they found that the environment created by the mother is just as important, if not more important, than the genetic predisposition (179). McCrae et al. used different personality characteristics to associate genetic predisposition to personality, however they found that cultural environmental factors are equally as important (183). The important commonality between these two studies is that neither nature, nor nurture, are wholly in charge of producing personality traits and behavioral characteristics.

The major focus for academic schools of thought surrounding the nature versus nurture debate is set on quantifying the amount of influence genetic predisposition or learned environmental factors have in an action, trait, or characteristic. As the breadth of scientific knowledge increases, the complexity of this debate will certainly increase. The main focus, as stated in the conclusions of the two studies reviewed in this essay, is to distinguish quantifiable measures of both nature and nurture in order to truly determine the objective truth behind personality traits and behavioral characteristics. Objectivity, of course, is the aim of all science. The rigorous nature of this debate speaks to how subjective it remains, and all parties involved should work to move towards an objective center. While increased complexity is a good thing in science, all parties involved in the debate should make certain that care is given when the nature versus nurture debate spills into writing governmental policy, criminal justice statutes, and health and human services protocol. Providing too much credit to either nature or nurture could have detrimental consequences for assumptions made regarding crimes, social services, hiring status, or other forms of unnecessary judgment.

References

Kim-Cohen, J., Moffit, T.E., Taylor, A., Pawlby S.J., Caspi, A. (2005). Maternal Depression and Children’s Antisocial Behavior: Nature and Nurture Effects. Journal of the American Medical Association, 293(13), 173-186.

McCrae, R. R., Costa, P. T., Saunders, P. R., Smith, P. B., Ostendorf, F., Angleitner, A., et al. (2000). Nature over nurture: Temperament, personality, and life span development. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78(1), 173-186.