Author: Frank Fenner
Publisher: ANU E Press
ISBN: 1920942637
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 376

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Book Description
Microbiologists; Virologists; Educators; Geographers; Biography; Australia.

Author: Cynthia Garcia Coll
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 1135628963
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 332

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Book Description
What does it mean to find a gene or set of genes that are associated with ADHD, schizophrenia, or autism? Could we eradicate such diseases from our species through gene therapy? Is it possible to eradicate from our genome the genetic material that predisposes us to be too aggressive, too shy, less intelligent, or not active enough? Who has the political power and/or moral authority to make these decisions? The premise of Nature and Nurture is that the complexity of the transactions between nature and nurture--between genes and the environment from the cellular to the cultural level--make these questions incredibly complex and in need of careful attention by educators, scientists, the public, and policymakers. A product of the conference held at Brown University in 2001, this book suggests that genes and environments work together interactively in a complex and closely intertwined fashion. The contributors to this book--biologists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and economists--present knowledge that enables research and application to transcend the traditional question of whatever variance or significance is attributed to genetics versus environment in the development of a particular behavioral trait. This book presents a variety of views on the current status of knowledge about the ways in which dynamic, developmental, mutually interactive systems in the genetic and environmental domains operate. The chapters represent contributions from different perspectives.

Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309069882
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 610

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Book Description
How we raise young children is one of today's most highly personalized and sharply politicized issues, in part because each of us can claim some level of "expertise." The debate has intensified as discoveries about our development-in the womb and in the first months and years-have reached the popular media. How can we use our burgeoning knowledge to assure the well-being of all young children, for their own sake as well as for the sake of our nation? Drawing from new findings, this book presents important conclusions about nature-versus-nurture, the impact of being born into a working family, the effect of politics on programs for children, the costs and benefits of intervention, and other issues. The committee issues a series of challenges to decision makers regarding the quality of child care, issues of racial and ethnic diversity, the integration of children's cognitive and emotional development, and more. Authoritative yet accessible, From Neurons to Neighborhoods presents the evidence about "brain wiring" and how kids learn to speak, think, and regulate their behavior. It examines the effect of the climate-family, child care, community-within which the child grows.

Author: The National Academies
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309178223
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 140

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Book Description
An individual's healthspan can be defined as the length of time an individual is able to maintain good health. In 2007, over one hundred experts and researchers from public and private institutions across the nation convened to find new ways of addressing the human healthspan and the elusive nature of aging. Experts in public health, bioengineering, neuroscience and gerontology discussed how stress and lifestyle influence the decline of health at older ages. Other discussions focused on the integration of technology in the quality of life, gerontology, regenerative medicine and life expectancy with regard to social and behavioral traits. Still, other groups explored topics such as the cellular and molecular mechanisms of biological aging, the effects of exercise on the human healthspan, and changes in social context to enhance functional status of the elderly. Most importantly, experts agreed that it was imperative to ensure that the elderly have access to medical services by establishing relationships with health care and insurance providers.

Author: Evelyn Fox Keller
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 082239281X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 118

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Book Description
In this powerful critique, the esteemed historian and philosopher of science Evelyn Fox Keller addresses the nature-nurture debates, including the persistent disputes regarding the roles played by genes and the environment in determining individual traits and behavior. Keller is interested in both how an oppositional “versus” came to be inserted between nature and nurture, and how the distinction on which that opposition depends, the idea that nature and nurture are separable, came to be taken for granted. How, she asks, did the illusion of a space between nature and nurture become entrenched in our thinking, and why is it so tenacious? Keller reveals that the assumption that the influences of nature and nurture can be separated is neither timeless nor universal, but rather a notion that emerged in Anglo-American culture in the late nineteenth century. She shows that the seemingly clear-cut nature-nurture debate is riddled with incoherence. It encompasses many disparate questions knitted together into an indissoluble tangle, and it is marked by a chronic ambiguity in language. There is little consensus about the meanings of terms such as nature, nurture, gene, and environment. Keller suggests that contemporary genetics can provide a more appropriate, precise, and useful vocabulary, one that might help put an end to the confusion surrounding the nature-nurture controversy.

Author: James Tabery
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262549603
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
Why the “nature versus nurture” debate persists despite widespread recognition that human traits arise from the interaction of nature and nurture. If everyone now agrees that human traits arise not from nature or nurture but from the interaction of nature and nurture, why does the “nature versus nurture” debate persist? In Beyond Versus, James Tabery argues that the persistence stems from a century-long struggle to understand the interaction of nature and nurture—a struggle to define what the interaction of nature and nurture is, how it should be investigated, and what counts as evidence for it. Tabery examines past episodes in the nature versus nurture debates, offers a contemporary philosophical perspective on them, and considers the future of research on the interaction of nature and nurture. From the eugenics controversy of the 1930s and the race and IQ controversy of the 1970s to the twenty-first-century debate over the causes of depression, Tabery argues, the polarization in these discussions can be attributed to what he calls an “explanatory divide”—a disagreement over how explanation works in science, which in turn has created two very different concepts of interaction. Drawing on recent developments in the philosophy of science, Tabery offers a way to bridge this explanatory divide and these different concepts integratively. Looking to the future, Tabery evaluates the ethical issues that surround genetic testing for genes implicated in interactions of nature and nurture, pointing to what the future does (and does not) hold for a science that continues to make headlines and raise controversy.

Author: Richard A. Lippa
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135604258
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 358

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Book Description
This engaging text presents the latest scientific findings on gender differences, similarities, and variations--in sexuality, cognitive abilities, occupational preferences, personality, and social behaviors. The impact of nature and nurture on gender is examined from the perspectives of genetics, molecular biology, evolutionary theory, neuroanatomy, sociology, and psychology. The result is a balanced, fair-minded synthesis of diverse points of view. Dr. Lippa's text sympathetically summarizes each side of the nature-nurture debate, and in a witty imagined conversation between a personified "nature" and "nurture," he identifies weaknesses in the arguments offered by both sides. His review defines gender, summarizes research on gender differences, examines the nature of masculinity and femininity, describes theories of gender, and presents a "cascade model," which argues that nature and nurture weave together to form the complex tapestry known as gender. Gender, Nature, and Nurture, Second Edition features: *new research on sex differences in personality, moral thought, coping styles, sexual and antisocial behavior, and psychological adjustment; *the results of a new meta-analysis of sex differences in real-life measures of aggression; *new sections on non-hormonal direct genetic effects on sexual differentiation; hormones and maternal behavior; and on gender, work, and pay; and *expanded accounts of sex differences in children's play and activity levels; social learning theories of gender, and social constructionist views of gender. This lively "primer" is an ideal book for courses on gender studies, the psychology of women, or of men, and gender roles. Its wealth of updated information will stimulate the professional reader, and its accessible style will captivate the student and general reader.

Author: Gisela T. Kaplan
Publisher: Other Press, LLC
ISBN: 9781590510346
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
The authors criticise the new, genetic explanations for human behaviour. They describe the theory of biology, and the reality in which a gendered world and the women's biology and the consequences are described. In the chapter 'Perpetuity' they discuss the gay and queer gene.

Author: Robert Plomin
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262537982
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
A top behavioral geneticist makes the case that DNA inherited from our parents at the moment of conception can predict our psychological strengths and weaknesses. In Blueprint, behavioral geneticist Robert Plomin describes how the DNA revolution has made DNA personal by giving us the power to predict our psychological strengths and weaknesses from birth. A century of genetic research shows that DNA differences inherited from our parents are the consistent lifelong sources of our psychological individuality—the blueprint that makes us who we are. Plomin reports that genetics explains more about the psychological differences among people than all other factors combined. Nature, not nurture, is what makes us who we are. Plomin explores the implications of these findings, drawing some provocative conclusions—among them that parenting styles don't really affect children's outcomes once genetics is taken into effect. This book offers readers a unique insider's view of the exciting synergies that came from combining genetics and psychology. The paperback edition has a new afterword by the author.

Author: Siddhartha Mukherjee
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1476733538
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 624

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Book Description
The #1 NEW YORK TIMES Bestseller The basis for the PBS Ken Burns Documentary The Gene: An Intimate History Now includes an excerpt from Siddhartha Mukherjee’s new book Song of the Cell! From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies—a fascinating history of the gene and “a magisterial account of how human minds have laboriously, ingeniously picked apart what makes us tick” (Elle). “Sid Mukherjee has the uncanny ability to bring together science, history, and the future in a way that is understandable and riveting, guiding us through both time and the mystery of life itself.” —Ken Burns “Dr. Siddhartha Mukherjee dazzled readers with his Pulitzer Prize-winning The Emperor of All Maladies in 2010. That achievement was evidently just a warm-up for his virtuoso performance in The Gene: An Intimate History, in which he braids science, history, and memoir into an epic with all the range and biblical thunder of Paradise Lost” (The New York Times). In this biography Mukherjee brings to life the quest to understand human heredity and its surprising influence on our lives, personalities, identities, fates, and choices. “Mukherjee expresses abstract intellectual ideas through emotional stories…[and] swaddles his medical rigor with rhapsodic tenderness, surprising vulnerability, and occasional flashes of pure poetry” (The Washington Post). Throughout, the story of Mukherjee’s own family—with its tragic and bewildering history of mental illness—reminds us of the questions that hang over our ability to translate the science of genetics from the laboratory to the real world. In riveting and dramatic prose, he describes the centuries of research and experimentation—from Aristotle and Pythagoras to Mendel and Darwin, from Boveri and Morgan to Crick, Watson and Franklin, all the way through the revolutionary twenty-first century innovators who mapped the human genome. “A fascinating and often sobering history of how humans came to understand the roles of genes in making us who we are—and what our manipulation of those genes might mean for our future” (Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel), The Gene is the revelatory and magisterial history of a scientific idea coming to life, the most crucial science of our time, intimately explained by a master. “The Gene is a book we all should read” (USA TODAY).