Parents dont matter?
 

Judith Rich Harris has made some headlines with her book "The Nurture Assumption." I have not read the book but have read her essays and articles about her and it seems she has a pretty good argument that parenting does not matter.

I think it does fit my own view that kids are pretty resilient, as long as they arn't abused they will do ok, or not.

Of course parental affluence makes a big difference for how well kids do in life...

I haven't read her stuff, so I can't comment specifically on what she has said, but I disagree. Parents tend to have a significant impact on their kids.

K-PAXians don't have families.

Neither nature nor nurture trumps the other one in all cases.

well here is the article, i think its interesting.

zero parental influence

Following is excerpt:

OK, well I read the article and I can't really disagree with it because it doesn't actually say anything. It questions current assumptions but doesn't come up with any conclusions of its own. It offers no evidence that parents have zero influence on their kids.

I think she's just throwing an idea out there to challenge people. Nothing wrong with that. I'm with Happy Monkey that people become who they are because of a balance of Nature and Nurture. Can't give parents all the credit (or blame) and can't say they have zero influence on their kids either. It's a mix.

There was a wonderful episode of Nova, called "The Secret of the Wild Child." It was about "Genie" a girl who was kept in isolation until she was found at 13. She couldn't talk. Scientists, though drawn to her, also saw an opportunity to test nature vs. nurture. It is a wonderful show, but everything was inconclusive because they could not determine whether Genie was born mentally retarded, or is her retardation was a result of her total isolation. There are very few cases of total isolation, so balance of nature vs nurture is hard to discern. I do believe, like some of you, that it's a combination.

It's a mesmerizing story. The girl draws you in. I wonder what ever happened to her.

Transcript here.

Im familiar with the nature vs. nurture debate and the only reasonable position is that its both. But the point is that what is known as "parenting" is not a heavy component of nurture. Or at least there is not any proof positive that parenting is a significant factor in how children turn out. In my own experience i find this reasonable. Just think of the people you know, good kids to bad parents, bad kids to good parents but mostly i draw on my siblings. 15 of them and all so completely different with roughly the same parenting technique.

Except the parenting technique is only roughly the same. The first child is parented very differently from the 16th. My mom is the oldest of a large number of siblings, and she ended up doing a lot of the parenting for some of her siblings, while she obviously had no older siblings to help raise her. And when she went off to college, a different sibling became the oldest, so the parenting style changed again. In addition to that, the parents will certainly have changed their methods to some extent over the years, whether from learning what works, or just getting tired.

Have you ever tallied the totals? I'll wager you only notice and remember the parent/child differences and the others, seeming normal, pass like repetitive scenery.

Rebellious teens is not a myth. Some take it further than others and some parents react stronger than others. By young adulthood, I'd guess the majority tend to realign somewhat with common values, if not goals.

There will always be exceptions and don't forget different is not necessarily bad.

My brother and I are as different as night and day. I think that's because being 10 years apart, we were raised when our parents were living in a rapidly changing environment and economic status. That can change the parents values and parenting attitudes as well as the nature of outside influences.

She ended up being institutionalized. There was also a huge controversy between two of the scientists involved in her care. It was something about who had the right to care for her, and then one of them died (natural causes), and the other found she was too difficult to care for.

It's a heart wrenching story. We studied her at Uni.

The reason no one will ever be able to prove the argument of nature versus nurture is because there is no way to have unbiased research. Meaning that you simply can't have two identical children to do the experiment with. For one thing, human rights wouldn't allow it anyway.

There will only ever be speculation.

Until they can turn out perfect clones at will.

It's funny you should say that Bruce, because that's obviously the only way to determine it. Of course, that's a whole different discussion. ;)

nature first ..nurture can bring out the best

lack of can twist,break,cripple

a whole different discussion:
 

Genetic clones would not experience identical developmental conditions in the womb; for example cloned house pets aren't even necessarily the same color as the animal they are a "duplicate" of, because their hair color is influenced by nutritional conditions during development. There is also epigenetics, IE the expression of genes, which is influenced by environmental factors (and btw has also been proven to be hereditary in some cases). What I'm saying is that the concept of creating "copies" of living organisms is a myth. Genes alone are not a concrete blueprint.

I disagree with the basic premise that parenting does not have an effect on the grown adult.

For example I know that myself and my siblings have a deep rooted "don't disturb the neighbours" attitude instilled in us by our mother. In me, this evidences itself as a belief that other people's opinions and happiness are more important than mine, and their opinion of me is the most important benchmark in my life. I live in terror of being judged harshly by the outside world and it has affected my job choices as well as general day to day life.

It was when I met a beautiful, witty, kind and generally all round great person who told the same stories as me and had the same ridiculously low opinion of herself that I realised perhaps this was a shared element in our pasts. Yup - her Mum was exactly the same (at least in that regard). Her story was complicated by a divorce, a natural father that showed no interest and a stepdad who had to be pleased at all costs, but I could certainly see parallels in our approach to the world.

I'm not blaming my Mum for my problems - I know my Nan instilled the same attitude in her - but I definitely believe that the values were taught and not endemic.

If nurture didnt matter I'd be listening to emopop-mallpunk right now rather than classic rock.

hehehe quite right! My kid is your age and loves classic rock too.

I didn't have anything to do with him learning the guitar. Us parents can take the credit for everything good. ;)

Fair enough Flint. The point was and still is, that it's pretty much impossible to ever really know the truth because it's an impossible experiment to conduct.

Oh, yeah. Apologies for the tangent. Your point was and still is a very good one. Carry on...

Don't tell that to psychologists and sociologists. There have been plenty of studies and research done on the conduct of human behavior and situations that set up the eliciting of a response.

Well, as sociologists can't even agree on what the 'definition' of culture is, I think they'll have a long way to go before they sort this one out.

I am a strong supporter of social factors. I have seen many people, including myself, change personalities and their view on life just from hanging out with different people.

Genetics still plays a role, some people will be independant no matter who they hang out with, some people will be leeches no matter they hang out with. It depends on the person usually...

I would agree with that fully.

sort of, its still surprising how identical those identical twins come out even raised in totally different circumstances. And im not saying environment does not play a role. Everyones misinterpreting this as a nature over nurture post. All it really says is that "parenting" (things like let them cry, pick them up, how much attention, authoritarian or permissive) pretty much anything beyond having s decent relationship with a parent, doesn't really play a role. Now if your parents are wealthy that plays a huge role in how you come out. ALso there are several studies out there that the kids real environment is peers and not parents. Peers determine how you come out.

There's plenty of evidence to suggest pretty much any side of this multi-sided argument.

There's no doubt peers have a profound effect on the thoughts and habits of the group.

There's also no doubt that different styles of parenting effect a childs world view.

There's also no doubt that genetics play a big role too.

The thing there is doubt about is how much influence each of these factors have.

I would say that research suggests that the answer is, it depends on what stage of life the child/young adult is at.

I agree with you except for the one highlighted. I strongly doubt that, both from personal observation and the fact of the ladies artcle i referenced that there is no positive support for that supposition. Now i know these studies are statistical in nature but what it seems to indicate (and no i have not read the original studies and not about to, that statistical analysis makes my eyes glaze.) is that researchers find little support for the idea that parenting style has an influence on how a kid turns out. Where as things like wealth and peers have a big influence.

As I said, it's a combination of many factors. I believe it would be slightly dangerous to suggest that parents have no influence at all.

From my perspective, I know my parents influenced the way I turned out in many ways. I wouldn't be who I am today if I had had different parents. I think most people would say that.

Sometimes it's a great idea to look at yourself and think about your own influences and there you'll find the answer.

I don't know, I have seen studies that suggest kids do turn out differently according to parenting style. I can't just get myself to believe that a kid will turn out the same if his or her parents ignore him or her as if the same kid had parents that were watching and regulating his or her every move.

It is very counterintuitive. Thats why i like it! :evil3: