Bouchard et al (1990)

General Stuff
Represents a fundamental change in psychology
Asks “Why we are the way we are” (what factors contributed to this)
Most people say it was their family, peers, or life changing events (these are
all environmental influences)
No one thinks of genes as a driving force behind people psychologically
 Behaviorism
Psychology during the 2nd half of the 20th century was dominated by
behaviorism – which is the theory that all human behavior is dictated by the
environment
Strict behaviorists thought that the internal human mind was impossible to
study, and it was irrelevant to the study of humans
People thought that biological factors provided no evidence of influence on
human brains – that kept behaviorism in its place (i.e. people become things
because they want to, not because a gene told them to do so)
Also, people are uncomfortable with the idea that they might be the product
of prewritten genes, not their own choices (uncomfortable with a lack of free
will)
All of these cause genetic causes of behavior to be avoided or rejected
 Theoretical Propositions
In a perfect world, all you need to do is separate two identical people at birth
and wait until they are adults to see if their traits are genetically similar, but
that is unethical and problematic
Society already did it for them, so they didn’t have to
The twins are called monozygotic twins (they start as one fertilized egg then
split into two identical embryos)
These twins are put up for adoption sometimes, so they are raised very
differently from each other
In 1983 Bouchard et al began to bring these twins back together
56 pairs of monozygotic twins from the U.S and 7 from other countries agreed
to participate
These twins were compared to monozygotic twins that were raised together
Method
 Participants
Most participants were found through word of mouth as news of the study
began to spread
All twins were tested to see if they were monozygotic twins
56 pairs of monozygotic twins from the U.S and 7 from other countries agreed
to participate
 Procedure
Each twin did about 50 hours of testing on nearly every human dimension
you could imagine
4 personality trait scales, 3 aptitude and occupational interest inventories,
and 2 intelligence tests
The participants filled checklists of household belongings to assess the
similarity of resources
They filled a family environment scale that measured how they felt about the
parenting they got from their adoptive parents
They were administered a life history interview, psychiatric interview, and
sexual history interview
All of these interviews were carried out separately so people couldn’t
influence other’s answers
 Results
If the environment was fully responsible for behavior, then the twins raised
together should be significantly higher, this was not the case
Some similarity results were as close as 1.02 and .987 out of 1
 Discussion and Implications of Findings
Show that genetic factors appear to account for most variations in human characteristics
The separated twins were really similar
There was little effect of environment on behavior
These results change everything – from previous research and beliefs to parenting styles
If personality is something that we can’t control that leads people to think “why should I bother?”
– this is a misinterpretation of their findings
 3 implications
1] The findings don’t suggest that things like iq can’t be improved
2] The environment can place influence on behavior (if it’s stronger than
genetic influence)
3] People’s genetic tendencies influence the environment (i.e. nice kids come
from nice places)
 Criticisms
Some just say this is wrong research
Some say the researchers aren't fully publishing the data
Equal environment of assumption – they assumed that the twins raised
together were in identical environments
 Other Studies
Arvey et al (1989) and Loehlin (1992) support Bouchard
People’s behavioral variations are because of genetic differences
 Recent Applications
Complex human behaviors can be genetically driven (like divorce)
The researchers found a genetic link to likelihood of divorce