3 - Genes and Environments in Human Development

Summary

One of the problems that happens when we read about ‘information flow’ from the genes is that it gives the impression that the information is flowing right now, today. As we’ve already seen, that’s certainly true for how the body reacts to different environments today – too much stress, too little sleep, lots of exercise and so forth. But when it comes to the role of genetic involvement in the many differences that we observe in human behaviour, then most of the time what we should be thinking about is our early development, especially our 9 months as a fetus and then the first few years of postnatal life. The way that genetic information is integrated with all the other bits of information flowing over that time leaves us with a lifetime of personality and other differences from those around us.