• Charles Darwin was not a psychologist, but the principles he discovered have influenced the field

• His book “The Origin of Species” was published 20 years before Wundt set up the first psychology laboratory

• His theory of evolution is the basis for a “still-active” approach to psychology

  • AKA the evolutionary approach

• Essentially, human beings evolved certain characteristics to help us, as a species, survive, thrive, and reproduce

The Evolutionary Approach

• All animals have behaviors and traits because they were ‘designed’ that way

• Heredity and environment is NOT the nature vs. nurture debate, but it can contribute to the conversation and the terms are similar to the individual concepts

  • Heredity is known as nature, and is what your genes and body contain

    • Genetics are not destiny

  • Environment is known as nurture, and includes the influence of what’s around you, what you’ve lived through, and what you could potentially achieve

Babies as an Example

• Reciprocal determinism is when an environment affects a person, who reacts, affecting the environment in turn

• A baby’s temperament may be hereditary, like if they are ‘easy,’ ‘difficult,’ slow to calm down, etc.

  • It’s not just what you’re born with, but what you’re conceived with

  • These factors come from the DNA inside you from the moment the two parent cells meet

• Certain aspects of a baby and more evidently, a child/adult, can come from the environment as well

  • Parenting style is very impactful on a person’s final personality

  • They parent’s own personality and skills will influence their child

  • Parents can have one of four styles: Authoritarian, permissive, authoritative, and neglectful

• These terms and concepts will be revisited in Unit 6

Epigenetics

• Epigenetics is the concept that environmental pressures can change the way genes affect someone, but not their structure

  • Those changes can affect metabolic processes and behaviors

  • These changes can also be passed on

    • This means that, in a sense, experiences can be inherited; at least, the effects of them

• Sustained environmental pressure not only affects the current generation experiencing it, wherein genes are turned on or off depending on what is needed in the context…

  • But it also affects the next generation

Helpful Terms

• This vocabulary may help you put some related concepts into words

• Polygenic means relating to many genes; if a behavior or trait is genetic, it is likely caused by many genes, not just one

• Diathesis are related psychological disorders; many disorders might have a genetic predisposition alongside an environmental trigger

• Maturationism relates to child development and the patterns they all (typically) follow; sitting up, crawling, then walking is a genetic progression, but when they do these is environmentally-influenced

• Plasticity is the brain’s ability to change on a cellular level to environmental events

  • Note: epigenetics cause slow changes from genes being applied or not, these changes are for the benefit of the species

  • Plasticity causes quick changes where the brain physical morphs, this is important for learning and therapy