nurture

• Nurture


  Psychological characteristics & behaviour due to environment. All behaviour is learnt = blank slate
• What do you call a person who supports the nurture side of the debate?

  Empiricist
• Which theory supports nurture?

  Behaviourists, Humanism
• What types of determinism is the impact of nurture on behaviour referred to as?

  Environmental determinism
• Support for nurture - psychopathology

  Watson & Rayner = Little Albert Initially Little Albert showed no fear of rats, classical conditioning led to the phobias supporting nature & hard environmental determinism. Practical application = treatments for phobias; flooding/ systematic desensitisation.
• Replication issues with Little Albert - against nurture

  Phobias are not always caused by previous experience & could be evolutionary in nature, eg. great apes are naturally scared of snakes
• Strengths of the nurture side of the debate

  Bandura - Bobo doll study -> children demonstrated that aggression in others than imitating what they had seen - aggression is caused by the environment.
• Weaknesses of the nurture side of the debate

  We may assume that children raised in poor environments have learnt their undesirable traits or that they have been led astray by hanging around around with the wrong group. Behavioural geneticists would challenge this view arguing that genes seek out their environment - Plomin calls this niche picking. Aggressive child more likely to play with -> increases aggressiveness of the child.
• Nurture summary


  Behaviour is due to the environment. Supported by learning theories, including behaviourism & SLT. Support: Little Albert study, Lloyd baby X study Advantages -> We can change & unlearn negative behaviours, Can develop practical applications which can aid the economy Disadvantages -> Too reductionist - no evidence to support that just the environment is involved