Issues and Debates

Question 1

Nature bullet points

Answer 1

characteristics are results of heredity (passed down)

genes are blueprints

influenced the biological approach

innate

nativist theory

Rene Descartes (1596 - 1650)

Question 2

nurture bullet points

Answer 2

born a Tabula Rasa (aka blank state)

empiricism

influenced behaviourist approach

John Locke (1632 - 1704)

quality is key

Lerner’s (1968) levels of environment - prenatal terms vs how the child is brought up

Question 3

nature approaches

Answer 3

biological (focused on genetics which you are born with)

Question 4

interactionist approaches

Answer 4

cognitive (looks at the cognitive neuroscience which your born with but schemas are created based on environment)

psychodynamic (born with the id, ego, superego and unconscious but develop through the psychosexual stages based on experience)

humanistic (born to reach self-actualisation but your environment affects how you go up to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs)

Question 5

nurture approaches

Answer 5

behaviourism (focuses on the belief that people are born as a blank slate and learn behaviour based on environment)

social learning theory (focuses on the belief that behaviour is learnt from observation and imitation)

Question 6

what is the heritability coefficient

Answer 6

0-1
proportion of a traits variability within a specific sample that is due to genetics aka, is a trait due to genes or environment
(0 - not inherited; environment, 1 - genetically determined)
IQ has heritability coefficient of 0.5 (Plomin, 1994)