Nature vs. Nurture

When analyzing the topics of nature vs. nurture, I believe in most cases that nature outweighs nurturing. For instance, there are several cases in which identical twins were separated at birth, and did not know about the other. The twins often times grow up to be extremely similar, like in the case we studied earlier this year about the twins, Jim L. and Jim S. During infancy, the boys were separated and adopted to different families in Ohio, unaware that they had a twin. The two had extremely odd similarities between them that seem to be more than coincidence. For instance, when the boys were younger, they both had had dogs that they named Toy, they both bit their fingernails, suffered from headache syndromes at the age of 18, each married twice, first to a Linda and then Betty, they named their sons James Alan and James Allen, they had a circular bench around a tree in their backyard, went to the same vacation spot each summer, and had similar hand gestures, voices and mannerisms.

In a more serious case to analyze nature vs. nurture, the case of David Reimer is an excellent example of nature overpowering. As explained in a previous post of mine on Ethical Issues in Psychology, David Reimer was a case in which a young boy was damaged beyond repair in surgery, and then was brought up by his parents as though he were a girl. This scarred him for his life, and majorly impacted him. He always acted as a tom boy even when he was being raised as a girl, and eventually decided to be a boy rather than the girl which he was raised as. Nature outweighed nurture.

On a lighter note, in more everyday cases in an average person's life, there are also things that lead to the conclusion that nature would overpower nurture. You know you've heard from some person that they laugh like there dad, act just like their mom, etc etc. A persons true identity is from how they were born.

Tempora the Super Heroine

This is the story about the super heroine Tempora!


Tempora was a normal person, just like you and me. She enjoyed frolicking through flowers, petting baby hippos, crying at the last Harry Potter movie, and writing blogs for her psychology class! But, one tragic day, she was hanging out with the Powerpuff Girls and accidentely drank some chemical x. But, instead of turning into a cute little Powerpuff girl, all that happened to her was that her Temporal Lobes grew, making her ears stick out even further than they already did. Tempora cried herself to sleep that night, but woke up in the middle of the night frightened, as she could hear and smell a fire raging. But, there was no fire nearby. She brushed it off as her imagination and went back to sleep. The next morning, Tempora awoke to her mother sobbing, and discovered that her grandmother had died in a fire a couple streets down. Tempora became extremely confused. Was she just dreaming about it? Or did she really wake up smelling that? She came upon the conclusion that she did infact now have super smell and sound. She swore vengeance upon whoever started the fire. For weeks, at every hint of a fire there was, she ran to the smell, but mostly just to be let down by a small fireplace or backyard bonfire. Tempora eventually began to give up. She began to ignore the smells, just shoving them off as small fires, as her nose became accustomed to the smell, and her ears the sound. But, one night Tempora heard a more intense sound than usual, paired with a stronger smell. Tempora raced to the smell, as it was rather close, and caught glimpse of a man running away. She chased him down, and with the aid of the angry villagers gathered with torches and pitchforks when they saw Tempora running, they caught the man who set fire to the house as well as her grandmothers, and put him in jail. They all lived happily ever after.!(:

I Am Sam

I Am Sam has truly got to be one of my favorite movies. It's a story of a man with mental retardation with the mental capacity of a seven year old, with a seven year daughter. Through a series of events, the courts find him incapable of being able to properly raise a child, and remove the child from his custody and into foster care. He then gets a top lawyer to work his case probono in an attempt to get his daughter back. The lawyer, Rita, only takes this case in the beginning to prove a point, but really ends up learning and developing majorly throughout. She fights right along Sam up until the very end, and all of the characters learn the value of love. But, I'm not going to spoil it and say whether he gets his daughter back or not. (; It would be movie I would highly recommend to someone though. That is, if they don't mind shedding a few tears here and there.


This movie has several components that relate to psychology. The major one is of course; the elements of both Sam and his group of friends with other mental disabilities. Sam and all of his group of friends are all fully grown adults living with some sort of mental disorder. In addition to this, Sam also seems to have a case of OCD. In several parts throughout the movie, Sam exhibits behavior such as going to a certain restaurant the same time every week, and having to eat a certain thing at a certain place, or else he becomes very upset. Another aspect of psychology is seen in the neighbor, Annie. Annie is seen to have agoraphobia, which is the fear of being in open spaces. Which she eventually overcomes for a short period of time to help Sam in court, but then again shows signs of agoraphobia when she screams when a car door is almost opened. Finally, there are also many different types of personalities displayed throughout the movie, such as comparing Sam's personality to Rita's. Making I Am Sam full of psychological components.