how does adoption and twin studies influence the nature vs. nurture debate?
463288
In adoption studies, psychologists studied how much children's IQ was related to their parents. For example, was the biological child's IQ closer to their parent than the adopted child to their new parent? They found that biological children have a closer IQ to their biological parents than do adopted children to their new parent. So that means that nature must have played more of an important role than nurture. However, when the adopted child came from an impoverished environment and was put in a better home with better parents, their IQ increased dramatically, which means that nurture still plays a great role in influencing a child's IQ.\n\nThe types of twins are fraternal or identical.\n\nThe nature vs. Nurture debate is about whether you become the person you are because of (nature) biological factors (meaning you are born with a certain IQ and certain characteristics that you inherited from your parents and cannot change) or because of (nurture) environmental factors such as how your parents raised you, if you were in an abusive or good home, etc.
807276
The acceptability of both is certainly culturally defined. While I will not issue an opinion on either, I am certainly willing to discuss the logic behind the various opinions often presented on the topic. One argument is that of religion. I will set aside the flawed logic of religion in general for the purpose of this discussion. If we seek to examine this issue within the context of our society's laws, we must examine the issue absent of religion...due to the separation of church and state.\n\nReligious issues set aside, we are left with the argument as it relates to the potential for the production of children with genetic birth defects. While incestuous breeding can arguably be linked to a increase in the likelihood of genetic birth defects, I do not see this alone as a reason to outlaw incestuous relationships. Consider this: If we were to outlaw a relationship between two individuals that had a higher likelihood of producing offspring with genetic birth defects (this, as well, is culturally defined to a certain degree), we would have to outlaw relationships between two consenting adults who are not related but both happen to have a genetic birth defect of their own. The answer above mine also raises the valid point that gay incestuous relationships would be exempt from this concern as well.\n\nIf we cannot outlaw it due to religion, and we cannot outlaw it because of the likelihood of producing genetic birth defects, then what is left? I would say that the only remaining argument would be that an incestuous relationship challenges our society's very definition (some would say "institution") of family, and what roles a family is intended to play. However, many have argued that homosexual relationships (specifically marriages) challenge our society's definition of marriage, yet our society is more readily accepting of homosexuality than it is of incest. \n\nTherefore, I fail to find a logical argument supporting any law against incest. This of course assumes that the relationship is between consenting adults of sound mind and legal age.
606633
The one that flies away will come back to see his/her twin 'AS HE/SHE WILL BE IN THE FUTURE'.  So, depending on your view of this ... you can decide if you want to know or not.  For example, if the 'older' twin is now sick with diabetes or Alzheimer's or some other 'environmentally driven chronic disease', it might be helpful and motivating to you, enabling you to 'change your ways' and reduce your risk for the same outcome in life!\n\n\nNote: this idea is based on the well accepted principle that most chronic diseases are not caused by genetics but are a result of a 'mismatch' between the individual's genetics and environment.  Therefore the returning twin can see that his/her sibling had a 'mismatch' in his/her environment that did not work well for their 'common' genetics.\nBest wishes.
279466
It really depends. I'm an adopted child and I have some issues with finding my biological parents. In the case of your baby, it really depends. Some adopted children feel abandoned and don't want anything to do with their birth parents. Others just want information and a sense of who they are. Only time will tell.
357346
I'm a twin, and we do have similar traits, we think on the same wavelength, but our personalities differ, i am outgoing, my brother is more laid back. So, i think it's in the genes.i'm like my dad, he's like my mum.
424673
Basically, according to Matt Ridley, in his book Nature vs. Nurture, there is no really good reason for our number of digits, simply that natural selection favoured it in a common ancestor a long time ago and so now it is programmed as part of our equivalent of a fly's Hox genes (body plan-which tell the body exactly which boday parts to put where via a complex and confusing mechanism. I know that the natural selection argument will not sit well with the many users of religious background, but both to them and you, I suggest both Nature versus Nurture and GENOME, by Matt Ridley. After these two books genes will seem a great deal less complicated than before.\nenjoy.
438716
I'd say no. Location has nothing to do w/ genes UNLESS you isolate the people in each city so the people inside them cannot reproduce with other people from different cities. Over time you MIGHT be able to see little distinctions because the dominant traits will have been passed around to everyone and then they will express it.
355892
I am a social-cultural anthropologist and the debate between "nature vs. nurture" will always be a heated topic (well in the anthro circle lol)\n\nI believe, after studying both biology and anthropology, that there is no way to separate the development of a person's character from their environment nor can you separate the environment from a person's character.\n\nWhat we do will affect our environment, and what happens to our environment will affect us. Studies have shown, that indeed, our environment (which constitutes not just physical living quarters but our society also) has a physical affect on our bodies development.\n\n*I would like to add for the "environment only" people's responses that if indeed all that our character was based on environment alone, everyone within the same environment would have the same character. This is logically impossible. We are born with innate differences in character (innate being a very touchy word to use) that make us react differently to life. Such differences can be seen with children who have autism.*\n\nWe, of course, will continuously have an impact on our environment...so to answer your question in 1 sentence:\n\nWe can not develop the character we have without both innate physical traits or our environment present =)
198684
Most of the differences are behavioral more than just "looks." But there are differences that cannot be detected by human eye. There are computer programs to determine the differences between faces for example and research done in Britain showed that except a couple of them, all of the twins can only match up to 30%, most of the twins were way lower than that around 10%; meaning they look same to your eye, but actually they are not the same at all, not even close.
513172
Me. Since certain talents and abilities, as well as intelligence, are inherited, we can have similar interests as a family member. On the other side, consider that we tend to expose our children to things we value or enjoy, so they may not have opportunity to gain other interests...nature vs nurture once again
313398
There is no "versus". Mendelian Genetics explained heredity years before when people had funny ideas about inheritance (there was one which said only the father contributed to the children's character and another which said it was the mum!). Biotechnology is using this knowledge as well as knowledge from diverse fields such as Chemistry, Physics, Statistics etc. to modify nature a little for man's benefit. Why the  "versus" question? Both work in tandem.
60382
Nature and nurture both play big roles - you can't really isolate one or the other.  And you can't really say that one or the other would make a random person smarter.  If you really want to learn more, check out some studies of identical twins who were raised separately.
28235
Ahh, another Nature vs Nurture discussion.  Of course it is both.  If we didn't have the genetic component, our early anscestors would have eaten non-healthy food and the human race would have died out.  For the environmental aspect, we learn to like what is around us and is easy to get.  If pig farmers couldn't get used to the stench, then no one would be pig farmers.
923387
So you seem to be arguing for a purely deterministic illusion of free will?  Free will as an emergent property of  a net mass of neurons?  Is this an argument about "nature vs. nurture"? \n\nI'm not sure what your argument or question is, actually.  But I would say that your initial question is false, or at least unsupported. If you are saying that my illusion of free will is god's gift or something, then I disagree.\n\nAtheists generally tend to be more rational about most things.
802289
In relation to what type of medical disorder or behavior?\n\n Knowledge about the balance between heritable and nonheritable risk in multiple sclerosis (MS) is based on twin studies in high-prevalence areas. In a study that avoided ascertainment limitations and directly compared continental Italy (medium-prevalence) and Sardinia (high-prevalence), we ascertained 216 pairs from 34,549 patients. This gives a twinning rate of 0.62% among MS patients, significantly less than that of the general population.      In continental Italy, probandwise concordance was 14.5% (95% confidence interval, 5.1-23.8) for monozygotic and 4.0% (95% confidence interval, 0.8-7.1) for dizygotic twins. Results in Sardinia resemble those in northern populations but in limited numbers. Monozygotic concordance was 22.2% (95% confidence interval, 0-49.3) probandwise, but no concordant dizygotic pairs were identified.
613414
Both. Your genetic makeup will determine a large number of factors in your makeup/development. Environment also plays a large role. If you look at the studies on identical twins, you'll see that they are extraordinarily similar for the first few years, but then start developing differences. These variations won't be physical, since those are genetic, but more behavioral.
239020
adoption or artificial insemenation.