The Formula for Fruition: Nature vs. Nurture
The Story of My Search
Have you ever wondered what makes a person successful? Why is it that people who grow up in the same environment grow up to have such different qualities of life? As a child of two parents who would be considered “successful” by society, I’ve always wondered how differently I would perform in life had I been the child of different people or raised in a different environment. I’d heard plenty of stories about people coming from bad childhoods or being raised by unsupportive parents and still succeeding, but my question was, how common is this? How often is it that you can find people who succeed, in the way that society imagines success (happy, relatively wealthy, good at their job, and a somewhat active member of their community), when they were not raised in a household that was optimal for breeding success?
My search began when I was accepted into Manual and noticed the competitiveness of the application process. I saw many people get accepted and many denied. Most of the people who got into Manual, regardless of their magnet, were raised in a household where they were supported very much by their family and were given many opportunities to work on their skills. Only a few of the people whom I saw being accepted came from low-income families or less economically, educationally, or emotionally supportive backgrounds.
Research has shown that children from a background of poverty are less than half as likely to go to college, with only 34% of impoverished children in America going to college and 79% of middle or high-income children going to college. (Webley) Even students with high GPAs and high test scores are less likely to challenge themselves after they g...
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...to be a good role model for them. I definitely feel that this project has helped me and potentially others determine a plan as to how to prioritize our goals for the future in a logical and helpful way, weighing natural passion and skill over the resources and support we may initially have.
Works Cited
Cherry, Kendra. "The Age Old Debate of Nature Versus Nurture." About.com Psychology. Web. 18 May 2014. .
Mason, Lydia. “Nature vs. Nurture in Education”. Survey. 15 May 2014.
Mason, Cynthia. Personal interview. 10 May 2014.
Webley, Kayla. "We’re Doing a Lousy Job of Getting Poor Kids to College | TIME.com." US Were Doing a Lousy Job of Getting Poor Kids to College Comments. TIME, 09 May 2013. Web. 18 May 2014. .
It’s considered a rarity now days to walk down a major city street and not come across a single person who is fighting to survive poverty. The constant question is why don’t they go get help, or what did they do to become like this? The question that should be asked is how will America fix this? Over the past year, Americans who completed high school earned fifteen point five percent more per hour than that of dropouts (Bernstein, Is Education the Cure to Poverty). According to Jared Bernstein, in his article “Is Education the Cure to Poverty”, he argues that not only do the poor need to receive a higher education, but to also maximize their skill levels to fill in where work is needed (Is Education the Cure to Poverty). Counter to Bernstein’s argument Robert Reich expresses that instead of attempting to achieve a higher education, high school seniors need to find another way into the American middle class. Reich goes on to say “the emerging economy will need platoons of technicians able to install, service, and repair all the high-tech machinery filling up hospitals, offices, and factories” (Reich, Why College Isn’t (and Shouldn’t Have to be) for Everyone). Danielle Paquette, though, offers an alternative view on higher education. Paquette gives view that it doesn’t matter on the person, rather it’s the type of school and amount of time in school that will determine a person’s
The argument of nature vs. nurture is a long-standing one in the psychological and social worlds. It is the argument about whether we are ruled by our genes or our upbringing. It is my thought that neither is true. It is nature working with nurture which determines our personality and our lifestyle.
A key to ending the cycle of poverty, is educational equity. In America today, public education is unequal racially and socioeconomically (Honda 11). Internationally, America is not excelling academically. When looking closely at American student’s Program for
Noted psychologist Jerome Kagan once said "Genes and family may determine the foundation of the house, but time and place determine its form" (Moore 165). The debate on nature versus nurture has been a mystery for years, constantly begging the question of whether human behavior, ideas, and feelings are innate or learned over time. Nature, or genetic influences, are formed before birth and finely-tuned through early experiences. Genes are viewed as long and complicated chains that are present throughout life and develop over time. Nature supporters believe that genes form a child's conscience and determine one's approach to life, contrasting with nature is the idea that children are born “blank slates,” only to be formed by experience, or nurture. Nurture is constituted of the influence of millions of complex environmental factors that form a child's character. Advocators of nature do not believe that character is predetermined by genes, but formed over time. Although often separated, nature and nurture work together in human development. The human conscience is neither innate from birth or entirely shaped through experience, instead, genetics and environmental influences combine to form human behaviorism, character, and personality traits that constantly change and develop throughout life.
One of the most intriguing science-and-culture debates of the twentieth century is that of the origin of behavior. The issue that has its roots in biology and psychology is popularly framed as the "nature versus nurture" debate. At different points in time, consensus has swung from one to the other as the supposed cause of our actions. These changes are not only the result of an internal dynamic but were subject (as they are today) to external influences, most notably politics and developments in other academic disciplines. The oversimplified polarities in this case-study illustrate an important characteristic of the larger scientific process. In search of a more refined theory, these are the necessary stepping stones in the attempt to get it 'less wrong'.
Having a college degree is more important now than ever before as there are fewer and fewer high paying jobs available to those with just a highs school diploma in America. This may sound like a good thing as it incentivizes more people to obtain at least an associate’s degree, but in recent years we have seen a steady decrease in college enrollment from its peak in 2010. This decline is focused mainly in community colleges where there were over 800,000 fewer enrollments according to government data (cite 6). The number of students that enroll in community college is particularly telling as these campuses cost far less and therefore draw heavily from low-income households. This data shows us that those in the poor of our country are increasingly less likely to get an education that would get them into the middle class or above. The brunt of this downturn can be blamed on the ever increasing price of a college tuition and the perceived lack of social mobility in America. The costs of a college education would be impossible to pay for most Americans without getting into student load debt that averaged $37,000 for the graduating class of 2016 and is only increasing (cite 8). As inequality grows there are more and more Americans for whom these staggering costs keep them from pursuing a degree. Furthermore, research by
The nature-nurture debate has always been a big controversy in the science world. Scientists, for many years try to figure out which of the two shaped
Undoubtedly, humans are unique and intricate creatures and their development is a complex process. It is this process that leads people to question, is a child’s development influenced by genetics or their environment? This long debate has been at the forefront of psychology for countless decades now and is better known as “Nature versus Nurture”. The continuous controversy over whether or not children develop their psychological attributes based on genetics (nature) or the way in which they have been raised (nurture) has occupied the minds of psychologists for years. Through thorough reading of experiments, studies, and discussions however, it is easy to be convinced that nurture does play a far more important in the development of a human than nature.
Currently, relatively few urban poor students go past the ninth grade. The graduation rates in large comprehensive inner-city schools are abysmally low. In fourteen such New York City Schools, for example, only 10 percent to 20 percent of ninth graders in 1996 graduated four years later. Despite the fact that low-income individuals desperately need a college degree to find decent employment, only 7 percent obtain a bachelors degree by age twenty-six. So, in relation to ...
Nature versus nurture is one of the longest debates that have been going on. Philosophers Plato and Descartes suggest that certain
The controversy of nature vs. nurture has been going on for many years, and a
There are many people in this world who are affected by poverty every day. Those that are in poverty are at risk of not having a good education and receiving a college degree because they cannot afford it. Not having a good education can have a negative impact on one’s lifestyle, so more people need to receive a college degree; especially those who have the potential. Having a college degree is highly necessary for students who are less fortunate because it opens doors to many opportunities and it gives them a higher chance to receive a well-paying job.
More and more people are falling into insular poverty. Insular poverty is rapidly growing, in our nation, into a huge problem today. It’s affecting student’s education causing them to work so much harder than the average American. To get a higher education in a poverty stricken home is almost impossible. Research is showing that poverty negatively impacts students during their educational
The future impacts of poverty result in reduced lifetime earnings, poorer health outcomes and limited future opportunities. The impacts on society as a result of a poorly educated population include increased health care costs, lower productivity growth and increased the rate of criminal offending (Boston, 2013). Michael & Dwyer (2008) claim that in the economy of the future there will be even fewer employment opportunities for people with limited education. Such a claim places further hardship on those suffering from poverty, especially when research indicates that those effected by poverty show an increased likelihood of leaving school with little or no academic attainment (Michael & Dwyer, 2008). Research from additional studies show that large proportions of children born into disadvantaged families do not enjoy high levels of educational success (Boston, 2013). Children suffering from the effects of poverty also have a lower prospect of achieving higher academic aspirations due to a strong belief that university studies is for those belonging to middle class families (Thrupp, 2006). Michael & Dwyer’s (2008) report concludes that the completion of education is clearly the best protector against long-term poverty. However, educational economist Helen Ladd (2012) suggests that
“A higher percentage of young adults (31 percent) without a high school diploma live in poverty, compared to the 24 percent of young people who finished high school.” ("11 Facts About Education and Poverty in America.") Overtime poverty in the classroom has hit a whole new high. Students cannot seem to find their place in life when they come from a low income family. Education now faces the struggles of everyday life of their students inside and outside the classroom. With today’s economy, when a low income family sends their children through school, the children follow the same footsteps as their parents. Such as; the poor continue to be poor, and the rich continue to be rich in a never ending circle, with slight glitches here and there. ( Walker-Dal-house) The board of education chooses wealth over poverty by giving to the rich, ignoring the poor, and restricting the help for the poor.