NATURE VERSUS NURTURE IN RACE

Nature versus Nurture in Race

Nature versus Nurture in Race

Introduction

The nature versus nurture debates concern the relative importance of an individual's innate qualities ("nature", ie nativism, or philosophical empiricism, nativism) versus personal experiences ("nurture") to determine the cause or individual differences in physical and behavioral traits. The view that humans acquire all or almost all their behavioral traits from "nurture" is known as tabula rasa ("blank slate"). This issue was once considered to be an appropriate division of developmental influences, but since both types of factors that are known to play those roles that interact in development, many modern psychologists consider the question naive - representing an outdated state knowledge. For a discussion of the nature versus nurture in language and other human universals, see also psychological nativism.

Discussion

Traditionally, human nature has been conceived not only as an inheritance, but divinely ordained. The differences between men and women, for example, were attributed to the will of God. Total ethnic groups were considered, by their nature, higher or lower. In the ages 19 and 20, however, intellectuals increasingly attributed differences among races, classes and genders to socialization (nurture), not innate qualities (nature). In the 20 th century, the Nazis conducted a program based on the concept of human nature as defined by the race itself. The Communists, on the other hand, largely followed the example of Marx's definition of human identity as subject to social structures, not nature. In scientific circles, this conflict led to the ongoing controversy of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology.

Epidemiologists have sought explanations for the surprising finding that on average, black Americans have lower rates of symptoms of mental illness than whites, despite the generally lower economic status, increased social tension, and higher rates of physical illness.

community-based surveys have found that the prevalence of psychiatric symptoms is higher among non-Hispanic whites than among blacks, although blacks have higher rates of physical illness and mortality before, a disparity that has baffled epidemiologists sometimes psychiatry.

Had apparently lower rates of mental health symptoms occur despite overall lower socioeconomic status and increased social tension among blacks compared with whites.

How to deal with that suffering has a short-term influences on psychiatric symptoms and long-term effects on physical, researchers said.

"[W] e hypothesize that when people are chronically stressful conditions faced in everyday life (eg, poverty, crime, poor housing), who engage in behaviors (eg, consumption alcohol and snuff abuse, drug abuse, and overeating, especially comfort foods) to help relieve stress-related symptoms, "wrote Jackson, Knight, and Rafferty.

"The intersection between social stratification and material interactions of race, social, psychological and stratifications are very complicated," he said. The issues that differentiate blacks and whites may be structural (such as income, employment status, housing), psychological (expectations), social (family structure, discrimination), and medical (chronic diseases), and vary at different lifetime.

Disentangling the effects of socioeconomic status race remains a problem, said Barr, a family practitioner and author of Health Disparities in the United States: social class, race, ethnicity and ...