HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT

INTRODUCTION

         The influence of heredity and environment on the development of an individual has very significant role. The individual’s personality is the product of both heredity and environment. In some cases heredity may overpower development and in certain other cases environment may very strongly influence growth and development.  It is because of this difference, individuals differ in physique, character and other personality traits. For the balanced and harmonious development of an individual, a balanced and harmonious interaction between heredity and environment is very essential.

HEREDITY

Every child comes into this world with certain physical and mental characteristics which he got from his parents and ancestors. . A child resembles his sisters, brothers, parents, grand-parents, and other members of the family more than the people not related to him at all.  He is born with a body and mind which developed from the fertilized ovum. His limbs and organs grow from the same. Some of his mental tendencies are also based on the same. This is all account of the heredity.  

Heredity is the process of transmitting biological traits from parent to offspring through genes, the basic units of heredity. Heredity also refers to the inherited characteristics of an individual, including traits such as height, eye color, and blood type.  It is the sum total of the physiological and psychological traits which a person inherits from his parents. These traits are transmitted through genes and chromosomes.  In the words of R.S Woodworth “Heredity covers all the factors that are present in the individual when he begins life not at birth, but at the time of conception about nine months before birth”.  According to Douglas and Holland “one’s heredity consists of all the structures, physical characteristics, functions or capacities derived from parents, other ancestry and or species”.

Heredity is of two types, biological heredity and social heredity. Biological heredity involves all those physiological and psychological characteristics which a person inherits from his parents through genes in the chromosomes. Social heredity refers to all that one generation gets from the proceeding generations in the form of social customs, traditions, ideals, values, believes, morals, conventions, skills etc. When each generation transmits these acquired skills and knowledge to the succeeding generations, it constitutes social inheritance.

ENVIRONMENT

          Environment is everything other than heredity, that influences an individual’s growth and development. It has a very significant effect on human beings. An individual’s environment is related to all those stimuli which he goes on facing almost continuously from the moment of fertilization. It includes all environmental factors that affect the individual’s development.  According to Woodworth  “Environment covers all outside factors that have acted on the individual since he began life”.   

          It denotes all the extrinsic forces, influences and conditions which affect the growth and development of the individual. Education, training, experience, nourishment and all other stimulations come under environmental influences. Environment can be divided  into two - natural and social. Natural environment means all those things and physical phenomena around that influences a person. Social environment refers to the cultural and familial heritage and the social forces presented by the contemporary human society.

 NATURE AND NURTURE CONTROVERSY

There has been a controversy about whether heredity (nature) and environment (nurture) is more important for the growth and development of an individual. Francis Galton, H.H. Goddard etc. supported the theory that hereditary influences are the more potent forces that shape an individual’s personality. These psychologists are called the hereditarians or traditionalists. Others, like Locke, Watson, Owen etc. believed that environment is solely responsible for what an individual becomes. These psychologists are called environmentalists or progressivists.  Both the hereditarians and environmentalists hold two extreme view points. 

Relative Importance of Heredity And Environment

The question whether heredity or environment is more important in moulding the personality is really meaningless.  The issue is like asking whether the seed or soil is more important for the proper development of a plant. The seed and the soil do not work independently, but are mutually dependent. In the same way both heredity and environment are equally important and are closely related and hence one cannot be considered in isolation from the other.  According to Mc Iver and Page “Every phenomenon of life is the product of heredity and environment. Each is as necessary to the result as the other. Neither can ever be eliminated nor can ever be isolated”