Final Research Topic

The topic for my research paper is whether twins, when separated and venture into the real world, stay incredibly similar because of the borderline identical gene pattern they posses or because of the environment they are raised in. Twins have been the subject of numerous scholarly studies over the past century, and their phenomena in the human existence has motivated people to ask the question of whether it really is genetics that makes twins so similar or could it be their surroundings that prove to be the biggest influence. There is much more evidence supporting nature in the argument, because it is much easier to prove that genes are the cause of similarity in twins. Therefore, twins are so similar due to the genetic predisposition they posses to have the same qualities and personalities as each other.

The sources I have already found have been for the topic of nature versus nurture in psychology as a whole, therefore not specifically for twin studies specifically. This means that I am not necessarily starting from scratch, but rather altering the sources AI have found to support my more narrowed down topic. Also, I plan on searching for more research that will specifically support genetic predisposition in twin studies, for which there is a multitude of sources out there that will do the job.

There are several problems I can see myself running into with my research paper, one being that I might have made my topic too specific from the overly general topic of nature versus nurture. With this in mind, I might add on another aspect of nature versus nurture that supports nature, such as how criminals and psychopaths become who they are. Also, the fact that there is no right or wrong answer to the subject makes it much more difficult to prove why nurture doesn't have the same impact as nature does in the argument, but as a response to that I will give convincing evidence and back it up with logical reasoning as to why nature is more of an influence.   

Nature vs. Nuture citations

1. English Men of Science: their nature and nurture, by Sir Francis Galton. Found on the second source of the wikipedia page for nature vs. nurture. This book presents the two cases of nature vs. nurture, but takes nurture's side and presents evidence for that. The book presents data of past events that back his point, and he also includes normal everyday happenings that we all experience. 
2. The Dependent Gene: Fallacy of Nature vs. Nurture, by David S. Moore. Found on third source of the wikipedia page for nature vs. nurture. Moore cites Galton as the original proposer of the theory but presents evidence of a highly interesting contradiction: a twin study. Moore points out the study that Galton did himself years before he published his work, and shows how when he researched twins they were shown to grow up to have remained similar to one another.
3. Nature Via Nurture: genes, experience, and what makes us human. found on first page of google scholar. This book takes an interesting view of the debate by suggesting that the concepts of nature and nurture are not separate, but rather intertwined so that one cannot be without the other. One excerpt from the text is that genes take their cues from nurture.
4. Childhood Experience and the Expression of Genetic Potential: What Childhood Neglect Tell us About Nature and Nurture. found on page three of google scholar. This book looks at the issue from yet again another angle: the affect of childhood abuse and neglect on the outcome of the child. This would be used as evidence for my argument against nature as there have been example after example of children being scarred for life by their upbringing. 

Research Topics

The first research topic that interests me the most is the issue of nature vs. nurture in psychology. This has been a heated debate in the world of psychology since the dawn of time, with the argument being whether people's innate qualities and personalities are planned out from birth or are they a collection of one's experiences throughout their lifetime? This would be a good research topic for several reasons, one being that for me psychology has always fascinated me so it would not be something that I would despise working on and revising for the 50th time later on in the semester. Also, I would be able to find satisfactory evidence for either side I could take in the debate, and therefore use that information to support my argument. Although I could take either side, the first thought I had when I first heard about this issue was that I strongly believed that nurture plays a more important role in forming people's personalities than nature does, thereby arguing that people's upbringing and childhood is what truly forms our perception of the world and how we act.
My next research topic would be whether or not the "technological era" that we've seen in recent years has crippled America's youth or has it started a new age of smarter and more social children. This topic interests me because I have been a witness to what technology can do on both sides of the table: I have friends who are addicted to online games and consequently do not spend enough time on their studies so their grades suffer, and on the other end I have friends who use technology to their advantage by multitasking and keeping up-to-date with necessary things. My argument for this topic would be that technology is indeed crippling America's youth because it is all coming so fast we, as a society, do not know how to adapt yet.      

rhetorical analysis paper - picture and thesis statement

 

The image of a little girl mistakenly attaching herself to two life size mannequins shows all three aspects of the rhetorical appeal: pathos by provoking an emotional appeal through sadness and sympathy for the little girl, ethos in that the corporation unicef is a trusted name for a good cause, and logos in that logically the picture makes sense by stating every child needs a family.   

 

pictures