Influence of Nature Versus Nurture on Child Development

Nature as well as nurture can affect the child development. There are many factors that determine the development of a child. Many theories that are proposed by psychologist are used to explain the process of child development. Berndt (1992) explained nature as the impact of the genetic inheritance or heredity of a person during development. Based on Kail’s (2010, p. 135) study, â€Å"research reveals consistent genetic influence in many psychological areas, including personality, mental ability, psychological disorders, and attitude and interests†, in which these characteristics are dispersed by having most individuals near the middle and a small number at the end of the continuum. Kail (2010) highlighted that the dispersion of the characteristics show polygenic inheritance, which is a patterns shown as a result of the combined activity of different genes. This means that the genotypes are usually associated with two (or sometimes three) well-defined phenotypes. Behavi oral genetics is a division of genetics that concerns with inheritance of behavioral and psychological traits and it is complicated. Heredity is never the sole determinant of behavioral development (Kail, 2010). Berndt (1992) explained that the level of genetic influence on intelligence can be evaluated by offering identical twins IQ tests and observe the similarity of their scores. For instance, fraternal twins who have their genes half-shared in average, has lower similarity in IQ scores than that ofShow MoreRelatedEssay about Child Development, Nature vs Nurture801 Words   |  4 Pages. The nature versus nurture debate is one of the oldest issues in psychology. The debate centers on the relative contributions ofgenetic inheritance  and  environmental factors  to human development. Some philosophers such as Plato and Descartes suggested that certain things are inborn, or that they simply occur naturally regardless of environmental influences. 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