Nature -nurture debate

• Environment

  Everything that is outside our body, including people, events and the physical world. Any influence on behaviour which is non-genetic.
• Empiricist/behaviourist view

  The mind is a 'blank slate upon which experience writes upon'
• Nature

  Any influence on behaviour which is genetic e.g. the action of genes, neurochemistry, neurotransmitters and neurological structures.
• Heredity

  The process by which traits are passed from parents to their offspring, usually referring to genetic inheritance.
• Interactionist approach

  The view that the processes of nature and nurture work together rather than in opposition. They are linked in such a way that it does not make sense to separate the influences of the two.
• Nature-nurture debate

  The argument as to whether a person's development is mainly due to their genes or to environmental influences. Most researchers accept that behaviour is a product of the interaction between nature and nurture.
• Genetic explanations

  • The more closely related two individuals are, the more likely that they will develop the same behaviours. The concordance rate for a mental disorder such as schizophrenia is 40% for MZ twins and 7% for DZ twins.
• Evolutionary explanations

  • Behaviours which promote survival will be naturally selected e.g. running away from fire or avoiding deep water. Bowlby proposed that attachment was adaptive as it meant an infant was more likely to be protected.
• Behaviourism

  • Behaviour can be explained in terms of experience alone. Skinner used classical and operant conditioning to explain learning and attachment.
• Social learning theory

  • Behaviour is acquired indirectly through operant and classical conditioning but also by directly through vicarious reinforcement. Biology has a role to play but the way a person learns to express anger is through environmental influences.
• Double blind theory of schizophrenia

  • Schizophrenia develops in children who frequently receive contradictory messages from parents, preventing the child from developing an internal consistent construction of reality.