I decided to focus my reflection on our article, "The Identity Dance".
The section about George the monkey was particularly interesting to me, as I have both an alcoholic father and uncle (brothers). They were raised in the same home, roughly 4 years apart, with the same abusive parents. It seems that although they may or may not have the gene, it was their environment that sparked the alcoholism.
Now my brother and I, who are 2 years apart, are neither alcoholics. We were raised by one alcoholic parent, and one non-alcoholic parent. Most likely one of us has the gene, but we have luckily not suffered from the disease. I would argue that it was because of our environment. Not only did we see what my Father went through when trying to get sober, but we saw how my Mom excelled in life. Those things make me personally believe that nuture is more important than nature. I do believe in genes playing a huge role in who we become, but I believe that your environment is more influential.
George and his cousin Jim prove this theory. George and Jim both have the same short gene but one is an alcoholic, one is not. Jim, who was raised in a "normal" environment with his biological mother, did not become an alcoholic. Unlike George, who was not raised in a "normal" environment.
This topic also interests me because, I grew up seeing both my friends’ parents as alcoholics and saw what it did to their family. Luckily my friend was smart enough to move away but her brother stayed in the family and is now a messy alcoholic, so there for I definitely have to agree with you that it has a lot more to do with nature as to how we become who we are.
ReplyDeleteResponse: I really enjoyed the Identity Dance article. I found it very interesting regarding the study of twins. What I learned was that maternal nurturing and discipline help to buffer the effect of the serotonin gene. I found the various studies on twins to be fascinating and very educational. My favorite study was about the monkeys as well (George and Jim). I can see a relation to nurturing environment being a huge part of how people develop into certain behaviors that might already be built into their genes.
ReplyDeleteI too also had an alcholic dad and a sober mother that worked very hard to try to raise us in a happy house hold. I feel like its a matter of chance. I have seen children raised with alcholism and then follow there parents footsteps and others learn from that and never want to drink for the fear of becoming an alcholic. I would like to know why some children become alcholics after seeing what devastating consequences it can have.
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