Genetic and Environmental Determinants of Happiness
Nature vs. Nurture
How happy we feel is determined both by our genetic makeup and the way we live our lives. A significant body of research has shown that close ties to family and friends may overcome a genetic disinclination towards feelings of happiness and well-being. There are other steps that individuals can take to improve how happy they feel, including improving diet, exercise, spiritual practices, and cognitive therapy. Science may have thus provided enough options that any genetic shortcoming towards feeling happiness may have become irrelevant.
Genetic and Environmental Determinants of Happiness
Nature vs. nurture is a way of contrasting the genetic and environmental contributions to an individual's personality, disposition, and behavioral repertoire (The Open University, 2007, p. 104). Although the term 'nature vs. nurture debate' is still used today, it isn't much of a debate any longer. Countless genetic and behavioral studies have shown that both influence human behavior to varying degrees and that the interactions between genetic and environmental determinants of behavior can be quite complex.
Inclined to be Happy
Take the sensation of happiness for example. Studies with identical twins have shown that when happiness is frequently experienced by one member of a twin pair then the other member is more likely to feel happy as well (Layard, 2005, p. 235). This finding suggests that our propensity to feel happiness is at least in part determined by our ancestral gene pool and that some will feel happy with less effort, while the rest of us will have to work a little harder to find happiness.
Nurturing Happiness
Much more attention has been paid to the role that the environment plays in determining how happy we are. This makes intuitive sense, because we currently don't have the tools necessary for making changes to our genetic material in order to increase our chances of feeling happy. That leaves...
Nature vs. nurture debate has been the center of discussion for many years. Some believe that human behavior is created naturally while others believe that human behavior evolves over time. The purpose of this discussion is to discuss both sides of issue and to develop an opinion about which side seems more accurate. Let's begin our discussion by explaining the nature vs. nurture debate. Nature vs. Nurture The first recorded experiment concerning nature
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