The nature vs nurture debate
Do people behave in a certain way because of their genes (nature), or because of how they were brought up (nurture)?
Published: 07:06 PM,Jun 08,2024 | EDITED : 11:06 PM,Jun 08,2024
The TV documentary ‘Three Strangers’ tells the story of the American triplets who were born in 1961 and adopted by different families immediately after birth as a part of an experiment conducted by a psychologist associated with the adoption agency who separated them and arranged their placements.
The first triplet was adopted by a working-class family, the second by a middle-class family, and the third by a wealthy family.
The experiment hoped to test the role of the environment where a person grows up in this behaviour and personality under the nature vs nurture debate which was a popular research topic amongst mental health professionals in the 60s.
The triplets were assessed regularly by psychologists for a lifetime to record their behaviour and compare them to each other.
None of the boys or their adopted family were informed that they have another two brothers and the men knew about each other by chance when two of them attended the same college.
When the triplets met, they were surprised that they looked and behaved the same way.
The documentary showed that they all suffered from poor mental health like their biological mother and in 1995 one of them committed suicide at the age of 34 years.
This project had a major ethical problem as it denied the three men the right to meet each other at an early stage as the psychologist who conducted the regular assessment on them avoided informing them so the study could be completed.
This research study would not have been approved these days as it breaks the key elements of bioethics by not considering the welfare of the three men who discovered their lives were no more than a big experiment.
I have always been interested in the nature vs nurture debate and have wondered, do people behave in a certain way because of their genes (nature), or because of how they were brought up (nurture)?
As a psychiatrist, I meet people with psychological problems while their siblings from the same parents who grew up in the same house do not have such problems.
Being a father of twin boys who carry the same genome and were brought up in the same house yet each has his own personality and way of thinking.
In my opinion, the nature vs nurture debate tends to exclude other factors that shape human behaviour.
We all know that not all sons of alcoholics have drinking problems despite carrying certain genes for alcoholism and growing up in an environment where alcohol is available.
The same could be said about the son of a criminal being a law-abiding citizen.
So what would be the consequences of adopting the nature theory? Would people be no longer responsible for their actions? Would you say that your genes made you unfaithful or a criminal and you should not take responsibility for it?
Should we give up imprisoning criminals or rehabilitating drug addicts as ‘it’s already determined by their genes’? Should we advocate for gene manipulation where we remove genes responsible for ‘deviant behaviour’?
All these questions need to be addressed from ethical and religious prospects.
The first triplet was adopted by a working-class family, the second by a middle-class family, and the third by a wealthy family.
The experiment hoped to test the role of the environment where a person grows up in this behaviour and personality under the nature vs nurture debate which was a popular research topic amongst mental health professionals in the 60s.
The triplets were assessed regularly by psychologists for a lifetime to record their behaviour and compare them to each other.
None of the boys or their adopted family were informed that they have another two brothers and the men knew about each other by chance when two of them attended the same college.
When the triplets met, they were surprised that they looked and behaved the same way.
The documentary showed that they all suffered from poor mental health like their biological mother and in 1995 one of them committed suicide at the age of 34 years.
This project had a major ethical problem as it denied the three men the right to meet each other at an early stage as the psychologist who conducted the regular assessment on them avoided informing them so the study could be completed.
This research study would not have been approved these days as it breaks the key elements of bioethics by not considering the welfare of the three men who discovered their lives were no more than a big experiment.
I have always been interested in the nature vs nurture debate and have wondered, do people behave in a certain way because of their genes (nature), or because of how they were brought up (nurture)?
As a psychiatrist, I meet people with psychological problems while their siblings from the same parents who grew up in the same house do not have such problems.
Being a father of twin boys who carry the same genome and were brought up in the same house yet each has his own personality and way of thinking.
In my opinion, the nature vs nurture debate tends to exclude other factors that shape human behaviour.
We all know that not all sons of alcoholics have drinking problems despite carrying certain genes for alcoholism and growing up in an environment where alcohol is available.
The same could be said about the son of a criminal being a law-abiding citizen.
So what would be the consequences of adopting the nature theory? Would people be no longer responsible for their actions? Would you say that your genes made you unfaithful or a criminal and you should not take responsibility for it?
Should we give up imprisoning criminals or rehabilitating drug addicts as ‘it’s already determined by their genes’? Should we advocate for gene manipulation where we remove genes responsible for ‘deviant behaviour’?
All these questions need to be addressed from ethical and religious prospects.