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Module 3

This document discusses three issues in human development: nature vs nurture, continuity vs discontinuity, and stability vs change. It presents these issues as topics for students to take a position on and discuss. It emphasizes that development results from an interaction between nature and nurture, as well as continuity and change. Later experiences can influence development and change a person from who they were earlier in life. The most accurate perspective is that multiple interactive factors contribute to development over the lifespan.

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Dela Rama Virgilio Stephen
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© © All Rights Reserved
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131 views

Module 3

This document discusses three issues in human development: nature vs nurture, continuity vs discontinuity, and stability vs change. It presents these issues as topics for students to take a position on and discuss. It emphasizes that development results from an interaction between nature and nurture, as well as continuity and change. Later experiences can influence development and change a person from who they were earlier in life. The most accurate perspective is that multiple interactive factors contribute to development over the lifespan.

Uploaded by

Dela Rama Virgilio Stephen
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Module 3

Issues on Human Development

Learning Outcome:

At the end of this module, you should be able to take an informed stand/ position on the 3
issues on development.

Introduction:

Each of us has his/her own informal way of looking at our own and other people’s
development. These paradigms of human development while obviously lacking in scholastic vigor,
provide us with a conceptual framework for understanding ourselves and others. Scholars have come up
with their own models of human development. Back up with solid research, they take stand on issues of
human development.

Activity:

State your stand on the following topics and issues.


1. Nature versus Nurture- which has a more significant influence on human development?
Nature or Nurture? Nature refers to an individual’s biological inheritance. Nurture refers to
environmental experiences.
2. Continuity versus Discontinuity- Does development involve gradual, cumulative change
(continuity) or distinct changes ( discontinuity). To make it more concrete, here is a question:
Is our development like that of the seedling gradually growing into an acacia tree? Or it is
more like that of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly?
3. Stability vs. Change- Is development best described as involving stability or as involving
change? Are we what our first experiences have made of us, or do we develop into someone
different from who we were at an earlier point in development?

Write your answer in 2 to 3 sentences for each number.


Analysis:
After answering the questions above, talk with your classmates, discuss your answer with
them.

1. Who is pro-nature? Or Pro-nurture? Are there additional reasons you can give in favor of
nature/nurture? Why?
2. How about continuity? Discontinuity? Can you give additional arguments to defend
continuity/discontinuity? Who are between continuity and discontinuity? Why?
3. Who claims stability is more correct than change? Change is more correct than stability?
Abstraction:

The issues presented can be translated into questions that have sparked animated debate
among developmentalists. Are girls less likely to do well in math because of their “feminine” nature or
because of society’s “masculine” bias? How extensively can the elderly be trained to reason more
effectively? How much, if at all, does our memory decline in old age? Can techniques be used to prevent
or reduce the decline? For children who experienced a world of poverty, neglect by parents, and poor
schooling in childhood, can enrich experiences in adolescence, remove the ‘deficits’ that they
encountered earlier in their development ( Santrocks, 2002)? Each one of you has your own
explanations for your stand on the developmental issues. What is the right answer? Up to this time, the
debate continuous. Researchers are on-going. But let me tell you the most lifespan developmentalists
recognize that extreme positions on these issues are unwise. Development is not all nature or all
nurture, not all continuity or discontinuity and not all stability or all change (Lerner, 1998 as quoted by
Santrocks 2002) Both nature and nurture, continuity and discontinuity, stability and change
characterized our life span development. The key to development is the interaction of nature and
nurture rather than either factor alone (Rutter,2001 as quoted by Santrock, 2002). In other words, it is a
matter of “both-and” not “either-or”. The message of this quote is crystal clear. “The interaction of
heredity and environment is so extensive that to ask which is more important, nature or nurture, is
like asking which is more important to a rectangle, height or width. -William Greenough.
To summarize, both genes and environment are necessary for a person even to exist. Without
genes, there is no person, without environment there is no person (Scarr and Weinberg, 1980, quoted
by Santrock, 2002). Heredity and environment operate together or cooperate and interact- to produce a
person’s intelligence, temperament, height, weight, ability to read and so on.
If heredity and environment interact, which one has a greater influence or contribution,
heredity, or environment? The relative contributions of heredity and environment are not additive. So,
we can’t say 50% is a contribution of heredity and 50% of environment. Neither it is correct to say that
full genetic expression happens once, around conception or birth, after which we take our genetic legacy
into the world to see how far it gets us. Genes produce proteins throughout the lifespan, in many
different environments. Or they don’t produce these proteins depending on how harsh or nourishing
those environments are.(Santrock, 2002)

Application:

Let’s find out where you can apply what you learned from the discussion of this developmental
issues.

1. Convinced of the interactive influence, of heredity and environment on the development of


children, talk to your parents and tell them how crucial their role in the development of their
children. Remember that heredity is already fixed. Their children have been born and they have
passed on these inherited traits at conception and that they cannot do anything anymore to
change them. So, concentrate on how they can contribute to their children’s favorable
development by creating the environment conducive to development. Like heredity,
environment is complex. It includes nutrition as early as conception, parenting, family dynamics,
schooling, neighborhood quality and biological encounters such as viruses, both complications,
and even biological events in cells.
Do not lose sight of the objective of your discussion. At the end of it, the parents should be very
much convinced of their role in the development of their children and get very much inspired to
do their part.
2. Do the same presentation (in #1) to a class in general Psychology where they discuss the nature-
nurture debate or to a group of student teachers.
3. Discuss the implications of this statement:
“ The frightening part about heredity and environment is that we parents, provide both”
4. Here is an interesting article titled “ How the First Nine Months Shape the Rest of your Life”
from the October 4, 2010, Issue of Time Magazine. Read, analyze then answer the following
questions:
 Does the article agree that heredity, environment, and individual’s choice are the factors that
contribute to what a person may become? Read the paragraph that tells so.
 Read the paragraph again. Focus your attention on the highlighted word. PERMANENTLY. Relate
to the issue on stability versus change issue. Does the word PERMANENTLY convince you that we
are what e first experiences have made of us (stability)? Explain your answer.
Big Ideas:

Complete the sentence.

With regards to nature-nurture, continuity-discontinuity, and change-stability controversies, the


wiser stand is______________________________________________________________________.

Test your understanding:

As far as our discussions are concerned, which statement is correct, and which one is wrong? Put a
check (/)before the correct statement and mark (x) the wrong one. If you mark a statement x, explain
why.

_______________1. Heredity exerts a grater influence on human development than environment.


_______________2. What has been experienced in the earlier stages of development can no
longer be changed.
_______________3. From the perspective of lifespan developmentalist, later experiences are the
key determinants of a person’s development.

Research
1. Read the published book The Nurture Assumption, by Judith Harris (1998).
2. State in not more than 1 paragraph the thesis of Judith Harris book.
3. A. Watch “Lonely one” in your You Tube. Only children: Debunking the Myths About Single
children.
B. In 1896 Granville Stanley hall described only children as “deficient on the social side”, “petted”,
“ Humored”, “ indulged”, and “ spoiled”. Today, many consider this a MYTH-WHAT DO YOU
THINK?

For related articles, refer to TIME magazine, July 19, 2020, issue. State in not more than 10
sentences the position expressed in the You tube and in the Time magazine.
4. Read on fetal origin.

Child and Adolescent Development


Looking at Learners at Different Life Stages
( Corpuz, Lucas, Borabo, Lucido)

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