Nature vs nurture debate

• Nature

  Innate characteristics determined by physiological and genetic factors
• Nurture

  Influence of the environment and learning experiences
• Interactionist approach

  Nature and nurture interact to form a persons character

  Dia thesis-stress model suggests that people have genetic predispositions for disorders e,g schizophrenia and the environmental factors depends wether or not they experience the disorder
• Passive genotypes

  People with similar genes are likely to experience similar environments e.g 2 siblings may be aggressive because they both inherited aggressive tendencies from parents but may also live in a hostile home environment
• Réactive genotypes

  Genetically determined characteristics may shape a persons experiences e.g people react more positively towards attractive people
• Active genotypes

  People with particular inherited tendencies might seem out certain environments
• What do the nature-nurture debates use

  Family studies, adoption studies and twin studiesn
• Psychodynamic approach

  Freud argues that personalities are the result of an interaction of nature and nurture
• Biological approach

  Emphasises genetically determined brain structures and processes aggression are genetically influenced by survival value
• Cognitive approach

  Genetically determined mental processes but accepts the environment influences their development and functioning
• Behaviourist

  All behaviours are learnt through conditioning apart from reflexes this approach is most heavily on nurture side
• Humanistic approach

  behaviour is natural need to reach full potential

  Nurture side of debate