Nature vs nurture essay sample

1. Running Head: NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 1
Nature versus Nurture
Name
Institution

2. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 2
Nature versus Nurture
Introduction
Intelligence can be described as the ability to learn from experience and to adapt to the
surrounding environment. The intelligence of an individual is determined by both the genetic and
environmental factors (Weinberg, 1989). It can be more accurate to state that almost half of the
variableness in a group of people is associated with heredity influences while the other half is
attributed to environmental influences and errors from measurements (Bernstein, Penner, &
Clarke-Stewart, 2013). Human intelligence consists of one-half inherited from parents and the
other with is learned from the environment. Intelligence does not have a comprehensive
definition but has three factors that define it as follows; reasoning ability, skills to solve
problems and the capacity of a person to acquire knowledge. The three characteristics are
measured by standard tests of intelligence scores of the tests. According to Plomin and Spinath
(2004), genetics plays a very significant role in the intelligence of an individual, for example, in
the case of siblings from the same parents but brought up in different environments. The word
‘nurture’ in this context means any environmental factor which can be from parents, prenatal,
socioeconomic class, nutrition, emotions, stress while the word ‘nature’ means that innate factors
or in other words the genetic make-up and biological traits.The examples of environmental
factors that influence the intelligence of an individual include emotions, social, economic
differences, race and ethnicity, motivation, ethnic differences, nutrition, sensory and intellectual
stimulation, and educational experiences.

3. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 3
Intelligence and Environment
A significant aspect assessed under intelligence and the environment entails emotions and
the measurement of intelligence. The non-cognitive features can have an influence on the
cognitive ability test measurement. When an individual is motivated at a moderate level, the
performance is likely to be best, but when the motivation is little, the performance tends to drop.
If a person is motivated and fails to do well in a test it brings a test anxiety. People with fear in a
test tend to do poorly. They tend to think they are not capable of passing. This, in turn, bring
symptoms like sweating, increased pulse rate and thoughts like "I am going to blow this exam If
this becomes severe the individuals fail to complete the test and this results in poor
performance.Test anxiety is highly related to low IQ but also evident in individuals with high IQ
experiencing fear during a test. One of the causes of test anxiety includes the gender stereotype,
for example, in math’s test where the teacher says that male students perform well than female
students before the test begins (Spencer, Steele, & Quinn, 1999). In instances when twins or
unrelated children are raised in the same foster home or environment, the correlation between
their IQs is high, contrary to if they have been raised in different foster homes.
The next aspect influencing an individual’s intelligence is his or her socio-economic
background. If children from impoverished backgrounds are adopted into homes with middle-
class living standards having good resources like interesting materials, exciting experiences,
provision of adequate support and adults who are responsive to their needs, they recorded a
moderate increase in their IQ. There is a great genetic influence on an individual’s intelligence
among groups from high socioeconomic classes and less genetic control from low
socioeconomic groups. However, a study shows that genetics and environment have important
influences on IQs. For example, a group of French children was adopted at birth. After years of

4. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 4
living in a foster home, they were tested, and the children who their parents were from upper
socioeconomic classes had higher IQs than children whose parents came from lower
socioeconomic groups despite the socioeconomic status of the adoptive homes.
In addition, race and ethnicity can significantly influence the intelligence of a child.
Studies have shown that in many countries races and ethnic groups have differences in their IQ
scores for example in US African American and Hispanic American children score low on IQ
tests than the Asian American and European American children who score higher on average.
This gap between the different ethnic groups is reported to be decreasing slowly. However black
children are known to be good in verbal tasks while Hispanics excel in non-verbal tasks. These
two aspects are brought by different factors for example motivation, biased tests to .and genetic
differences among them.
The ability of the parents to motivate their children also influences the sibling’s IQ.
Another possibility why individuals have different intelligence is on motivation. For example,
the examiner might not be friendly or can be of different race/ethnic background or the content
of the test. The examiner can test learners using a chain of difficult questions. With such a move,
the minority group feels less motivated to perform well in their test due to anxiety or resisting
being judged by the examiner. Middle-class African American children are not comfortable
during a test than white middle-class children. They see no less value on themselves for passing
the test. The fellow African American peers attribute their efforts to "acting white" if the work
hard for academics success which is common with white children.
Motivation from the parents is also important. Parents and home from a high social class
have time and resources to motivate their children than those who come from impoverished

5. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 5
backgrounds who barely have time and resources to do that. Parents who are learned will take
the time to encourage and motivate their children with guidance as well as material like presents
if they perform well in the test. Children from parents who never had good education are likely
to get less or no motivation from their parents.
Another factor influencing an individual’s intelligence is nutrition. According to studies
carried out, nutrition mostly is harmful to individuals cognitive growth during early stages of
growth (prenatal and the second year of life) (Lynn, 1990). Some data from studies shows that
prenatal nutrition can influence the intelligence. For example, Lynn (1990) retraced the studies
of twins whose birth-weight had been obtained on birth then compared to their intelligence. The
findings showed that twins who were heavier at birth had higher IQs than those who were
lighter. This attributed the prenatal nutrition to influencing of the IQs. In another study, a
comparison was made among three groups of children from Korea who were adopted by the
American parents (Lynn, 1990). They were grouped according to the level of nourishment at the
age three at adoption. At age ten, malnourished ones had 10 points below the children who were
well nourished.
Another scientific study was carried out by Rush, Stein, and Susser (1980) who used
black pregnant women with a high risk of giving birth to low birth-weight babies and were
divided into three. One group was given a high protein liquid supplement; the second was given
a high-calorie liquid while the third and last group acted as the control. At age one, all the
children were tested, and those from the mothers who were receiving a high protein liquid
supplement had a better response recovery to a change in the visual stimulation pattern than
those from the mothers who received a high-calorie liquid supplement and those from the control
group. This shows that nutrition is a major factor that influences the IQ.

6. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 6
An individual’s IQ can also be affected by the Socio-cultural factors on the environment.
People's culture may also influence their associated intelligence. For example, parents who have
several books at home; their children have shown positive correlation with intelligence. A first
born has been attributed to scoring high in some studies. Stereotyping a particular group of
people also correlates to test scores. For example in some communities in Africa, there is the
belief that girls are not supposed to attend school like boys. Beliefs such as women cannot
venture in some fields of study also leads to a significant influence on intelligence.
Stress also influences the development of intelligence in human beings especially in early
stages of life. Studies have shown that if children from all races are exposed to violence in their
childhood, it leads to scoring lower grades in their tests and having low IQ.A study done on first
grade African American children and their caregivers were evaluated using interviews,
standardized tests, self-report including IQ tests. The report attributed exposure to violence and
trauma-related discomfort in young children to a significant decrease in IQ and reading
achievement.
Intelligence is also affected by the length an individual received an education. Several
studies have shown that schooling influences an individual’s intelligence. If an individual has a
higher intelligence, he takes more time extending his or her education which in turn increases the
person's IQ. According to Kline (1991), the child’s educational future progress and attainment
can be predicted using child’s intelligence by the age of 5. Delaying in schooling process can
cause a drop in IQ by 5 points and also there is a temporary drop in the IQ of children during
school vacations when they are not engaged in any educational activities (Wahlsten, 1997).
There is also a 2.7 IQ increase for every year of schooling, thus if prediction of the IQ is to be

7. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 7
made, then the two factors i;.e. early IQ and the number of years of schooling have to be
considered (Kim, Cramond, & VanTassel-Baska, 2010).
Intelligence and Genetics
The concept of intelligence and genetics is explained by the genes which are believed to
have a high or low IQ from parents, and considerable examples are the “family” and “twin
study." Explorations by psychologists and scientists used identical (monozygotic) twins and the
fraternal (dizygotic) twins (Plomin & Spinath, 2004). The identical twins comprise of the same
fertilized egg meaning that they have 50% genetic makeup from their parents. They found out
that hereditary factors are strongly correlated to IQ in identical twins. For example, comparing
the IQs of identical twins and fraternal twins with same genes and who are raised in different
environments from their tender age by different families. If the twins are tested and their scores
compared their score will be 10.60 (Bouchard & Segal, 1985). That is if one twin scores high the
other one will probably score high; if one score low the other one probably will too despite the
different environments they have been raised in. Therefore, it becomes evident that heredity
influences an individual’s intelligence. However, even if twins are raised in separate homes by
different parents for cases of adoption, they end up having same IQ scores.
Among the studies that have been carried out to provide evidence of heredity is the
“adoption studies.” If adopted children are compared adoptive parent to some extent due to the
environment with their biological and adoptive parents .the adopted children will similar to their
biological parents by genetic make-up but will also be close to the environment. Their IQs scores
will also be highly correlated to their biological parents than those of the adoptive parents
(Plomin & Spinath, 2004). This means if parents with high IQs give out their children for

8. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 8
adoption, those children will have a high IQ score despite the environment of their adoptive
parents.
Conclusion
From the above comprehensive discussion, it is evident that defining the term
"intelligence" is somehow difficult, but it has common words which are the pillars of its
definition (learning from experience and adapting). Both heredity (nature) and the environment
(nurture) have a great contribution to the intelligence of human beings. The inherited intelligence
is combined with what is learned from the surrounding as the individual grows. The heredity
does not determine the IQ as it only sets a range which the child’s abilities will fall based on the
environmental factors or experiences. The environmental conditions can interfere with the
intelligence regardless of the inherited intelligence (Kim, Cramond, & VanTassel-Baska, 2010).
The two concepts of nature and the nurture should be used in early stages of growth in
children to help them attain their full potential in their lives. For example, the test scores should
be used to guide, counsel and direct the child towards his or her potential other than condemning
them. The mother nature of genetics should not be left to be the only determinant of human
intelligence as there are a lot of other nurturing factors such as socioeconomic status, culture,
education, nutrition, and such.

9. NATURE VERSUS NURTURE 9
References
Bernstein, D. A., Penner, L. A., & Clarke-Stewart, A. (2013). Psychology. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth: Cengage Learning.
Bouchard, T. J., & Segal, N. L. (1985). Environment and IQ. In B. B. Wolman, Handbook of
Intelligence: Theories, Measurements, and Applications (pp. 391-464). New York: John
Wiley.
Kim, K. H., Cramond, B., & VanTassel-Baska, J. (2010). Chapter 21- The relationship between
Creativity and Intelligence. In R. J. Sternberg, & J. C. Kaufman, Cambridge Handbook of
Creativity (pp. 395-412). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press.
Kline, P. (1991). Intelligence: The Psychometric View. London: Routledge.
Lynn, R. (1990). The role of nutrition in secular increases in intelligence. Personality and
Individual Differences, 11 (3), 273 – 285.
Plomin, R., & Spinath, S. M. (2004). Intelligence: Genetics, Genes, and Genomics. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 86 (1), 112-129.
Rush, D., Stein, Z., & Susser, M. (1980). A randomized controlled trial of prenatal nutritional
supplementation in New York City. Pediatrics, 65 (4), 683-97.
Spencer, S. J., Steele, C. M., & Quinn, D. M. (1999). Stereotype Threat and Women’s Math
Performance. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 35 (4), 4-28.
Wahlsten, D. (1997). The malleability of intelligence is not constrained by heritability. In B.
Devlin, S. E. Fienberg, & K. Roeder, Intelligence, Genes, and Success: Scientists
Respond to The Bell Curve (pp. 71-87). New York: Springer.
Weinberg, R. A. (1989). Intelligence and IQ: Landmark Issues and Great Debates. American
Psychologist, 44, 98-104.