Parenting Doesn’t Matter (Or Not As Much As You Think)

[Music] thank you very much indeed Hannah thank you all for coming this is very exciting now when it comes to parenting everyone is an expert and we all have some skin in the game so what I'm hoping tonight is that because it's a debate we're going to get an answer and that means that we're gonna hear the four sweetest words in the English language I told you so and never these words sweeter than when they're uttered between a parent and a child in one direction or another um I listen to this debate from an extremely luxurious position because my son lives with his mother and his stepfather who are both superb parents so I get to watch this on the sidelines and think well if I know if it really matters well that's all right they're taking care of it for me not only that but because I'm an identical twin he has two biological fathers as well as his lovely stepfather and as he frequently reminds me if I ever get married he'll have two mothers so he's gonna have five parents so I really I'm pretty low in the mix with all of this so I get to enjoy it no matter the outcome the motion is parenting doesn't matter or not as much as you think so here's what's happened you've already voted on the motion shortly we're gonna hear the opening remarks of our speakers and then I'm going to announce the results of the first vote and then there's going to be some debate then we're going to take your questions and you're going to vote again now you have these voting cards that are for and against and here's how you vote if you're four you place the four one in if you're against bless the against one in and if you're not sure you pitted put it in on taunt so on taunt so throughout the evening as you anxiously bend it back and forth and worry it do not tear it in half because then you're committed to making a decision and you are allowed to be undecided at the end of the evening okay so we have four amazing speakers let me talk you through our first speaker who is in favor of the motion Robert Plomin believes that parent doesn't matter or not nearly as much as you might think he is a psychologist and a professor of behavioral genetics of the Institute of Psychiatry psychology and neuroscience at King's College London and his new book blueprint how DNA makes us who we are argues that the most important thing our parents give us is our genes and the parenting styles don't really affect children's outcomes Robert take it away [Applause] [Music] when I was in graduate school 45 years ago psychology was so dominated by environmentalism the view that we are what we learned that genetics it was a dangerous to even mention genetics we were told for example that schizophrenia was caused by what your mother did to you in the first few years of life in the ensuing 44 decades a mountain of evidence has accumulated that's convinced most scientists of the importance of inherited DNA differences in shaping who we are as individuals that message is getting pretty well-known but what isn't quite as well-known is the other part of the message and that is these are the best evidence we have for the importance of the environment but the data show that the way the environment works is very different from the way environmentalists thought it worked it's not due to systemic in Vartan environmental influence like parenting that we would call nurture that the salient environmental influences are essentially idiosyncratic stochastic in a word random so I'll try and convince you of that in my remaining nine minutes but to summarize it an easy way of remembering it is that I'm saying that if you were adopted at Birth you were reared by different parents you grew up in a different family you went to a different school had different friends had a different job you would essentially be the same similar to who you are now and that isn't just the thought experiment Bobby went to what grew up in New York and at 19 he went to upstate New York to go to university on his first day on campus people came up to Bobby calling him Eddie and they seemed to know who he was and he found out soon because he met Eddie and it was he said it was like looking in a mirror this other person was very similar to him and then it turned out they had both been adopted at the same adoption agency in city and the publicity that came from this brought out a very rare case of an identical triplet who is also extremely similar and they're not just similar physically they're also similar psychologically they're all in personality they're all outgoing their interests are similar they're all interested in acting and they're also similar in terms of mental health and illness they're all prone to depression and so this remarkable story is being told in a film that's coming out at the end of this month in the UK it came out in the States in the summer and it won an award at Sundance for a documentary film so it really is I would really encourage people to see it because it's a dramatic illustration of the importance of genetics despite differences in nurture one of these was a beard in a lower-class family one in a middle-class family and one in an upper-class family and yet they're still so remarkably similar but although it's dramatic you don't need identical twins reared apart to separate nature and nurture so Xand and his brother Chris as you know are identical twins and they're actually more different physically than a lot of identical twins and is the short chubby one he's he's a half-inch shorter than his brother Chris and yeah and six kilos and Counting heavier but de grâce so although they're reared together you can compare identical twins to non identical twins one percent of all births are twins one-third are identical twins identical twins or clones they have the same DNA non identical twins like any brother and sister are 50% similar genetically so that method the twin method has been used to study hundreds of psychological traits and that's what I've done in my study in the UK that I began when I came to England in 1994 it's called the twins early development study so we studied a lot of aspects of childhood development and we find like everyone else does that about half of the differences we see in kids psychological development including educational achievement and mental health and illness can be explained by genetic differences the environment but that means 50 percents environmental but these environmental differences aren't due to nurture they're not due to systemic forces in the family that make kids in a family similar whatever it is it's making two kids in the same family as different as kids and other families and that includes identical twins a method that is makes it easier to understand that is the adoption method so parents and offspring share nature and nurture but with adoption you can separate those two you can study genetic parents who share nature but not nurture these are biological parents and they're adopted away kids and you can study environmental parents adoptive parents who share nurture but not nature with their children so for weight for example you can predict the child's about 10 percent of the differences in children's weight with their parents weight is that nature or nurture with adopted children you can't predict any variants any differences between the kids weight from their adoptive parents there's no relationship between the adoptive parents and the adopted children whereas those adopted children are correlated as much with their birth parents who they never saw after the first year of life as our children reared by their biological parents suggesting the importance of nature and not nurture so I want to emphasize that we're talking about differences why children differ in personality and mental health and illness and mental abilities and disabilities and we're describing those differences there's two caveats that are very important we're describing what is the genetic and environmental factors that exist in a population at the time we study it we're not talking about what could be so weight you may be surprised to know it's about 70% heritable that means of the differences in weight in this room about 70% of the differences are due to inherited DNA differences even if it was a hundred percent heritable it doesn't mean you can't change your weight if you stop eating you lose weight so this is the difference between what is and what could be and its second caveat that I think is very important in terms of the other speakers is that we're talking about the normal range of environmental and genetic influences we're not talking about the genetic extremes of rare mutations that can have devastating effects on the child nor are we talking about the environmental extremes like neglect and abuse so I know it's a lot to take on board in ten minutes but the first half of my book talks about all these issues in detail so you know if you want to get the evidence behind these sorts of conclusions it is available there in summary what the book is trying to say is that inherited DNA differences are the major systemic force in shaping who we are the environment is important but it's essentially random it's not systemic effects of very family variables like parenting and then thirdly a third finding is we call the nature of nurture that a lot of what looks like systemic environmental effects is actually reflecting genetic differences so we find that hundreds of studies have looked at the correlation between parenting aspects of parenting and children's outcomes but you can't assume that correlation is causal environmentally because parents share 50% of their genes with their children and furthermore we know that parents respond to genetic differences in their children unless you have a genetically sensitive design you can't separate out the effects of nature and nurture so these three findings lead me to the title of the book that DNA is the major systemic source of individual differences between us and when you think about it in terms of parenting I've done probably 20 interviews and the phrase that gets most people's attention is relevant to tonight and that is that parents matter but they don't make a difference so in although it's confusing in terms of the title that you're voting on I believe that parents matter a lot they're the NASA / don't make a difference in terms of the kids psychological outcomes so I think of it I think it's important we don't think of parenting as a means to an end I think that this is where I get on the soapbox I think of parenting as a relationship and just as with our relationship with our partners and our friends I think our relationship with our children should be based on loving them rather than changing them and instead of trying to change children we can there's the difference between what is and what could be we can change them but instead of always trying to change them and molding them into what we want to be doesn't it make sense to think about going with the genetic flow and find out what they like to do and what they're good at and help them to do that because if you love them you want what's best for them and I hope this is the liberating message for parents one that relieves them of some of the anxiety and guilt that is piled on parents by parent blaming books that scare parents into thinking one false move and their child's going to be ruined forever so in conclusion I I suggest that parents relax and enjoy their relationship and that part of this enjoyment comes from watching our children become who they are genetically thank you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Robert thank you very much indeed well some of you may feel that that let you off the hook a bit but others of you may be wanting to feel useful and that you can make a difference unfortunately for you our next speaker is going to argue against the motion Susan Paul B is a developmental clinical psychologist and a visiting senior research fellow in the School of Life Course Sciences at King's College London she's undertaken several research studies including the South London child development study which examined the effects that the mother's adverse experiences have had on their offspring from childhood into young adulthood Susan take it away [Applause] [Music] ladies and gentlemen parenting does matter and maybe more than you think and this is why I'm opposing the motion we all have two biological parents most of you will know who they are some may not I invite you to hold your parents or those who cared for you as a child in mind ask yourself this question have your parents and the way that you were brought up whether for good or ill had an influence on your life and who you are today Robert would say not really in fact he has said that if you had been adopted out of the family gone to a different school held a different job you would essentially be the same person as you are today I think this is not true I believe that parenting does matter and what is more it matters even before you are born evidence based on 30 years of research shows that our experience in the womb has profound implications for our well-being from conception to death exposure to maternal depression as a fetus as an impact on the well-being of the infant child teenager and young adult Robert has described how genetic research has exploded over the last decade this new knowledge has emboldened him to say that parenting doesn't matter but there's also been an explosion of research in neuroscience biochemistry psychology and psychoanalysis and this emboldened me to say that parenting does matter in order to show you how important parenting is during the nine months of pregnancy I will describe how rapidly the human fetal brain develops at four weeks the brain of the embryo is not much bigger than a grain of salt and at seven weeks it barely measures six millimeters but fast forward to the final trimester and the developing baby's brain has increased in size by 260 percent to 341 cubic centimeters a third of the size of the adult brain and this does not happen on its own the developing fetus collaborates with a mother on a mutual construction project the fetus needs the mother to provide an environment that's healthy and this does not just mean good nutrition the fetus also shares the mother's State of Mind a mother-to-be may be under stress because of a demanding job conflicts in a relationship or a lack of resources stress is not helpful for the fetus although a little stress may be fine we have shown that stress can lead to cortisol the stress hormone crossing the placenta and reaching the fetus affecting the development of the brain David Barker was the first to show that the environment of the womb plays a powerful role in influencing our later susceptibility to certain chronic diseases and how long we live studies have shown that if you stress an animal during pregnancy this will have long-term effects but we didn't know if this happened in humans because it's unethical to stress a human fetus we have to wait for natural or man-made disasters to occur changes brought about by undernutrition during gestation were found in the children of pregnant women exposed to the Dutch famine at the end of World War two these children were more susceptible to diabetes obesity and cardiovascular disease the finding that certain circumstances in life cause can cause genes to be turned off or turned on is what we call epigenetics this is something that Robert has let go and yet it is of fundamental importance when we think about how parenting matters or doesn't matter my cremini one of the world's leading epigenetic cysts discovered the importance of maternal care in modifying the expression of genes that regulate the stress response in other words mothering changes gene expression you desert with pregnant survivors of 9/11 also showed that traumatic experiences can leave epigenetic marks that alter the stress response in the offspring the children of women who were raped by the rebels and then forced to kill while pregnant in northern Uganda showed psychosomatic symptoms in the form of fainting spells as if they were dead my own work in South London has shown that children exposed to the mothers depression while in the womb as opposed to after birth or more prone to having emotional and conduct problems throughout their lives at 25 they had higher c-reactive protein levels in the blood inflammatory markers indicative of both physical and mental ill health we also found that a mother's history of mental illness or her polygenic score for mental illness did not predict the offsprings problems as might be expected according to Robert's thesis it was the children's exposure to maternal stress in the boom that predicted them prenatal like life is a time of enormous neurological change and the nervous system is particularly vulnerable to programming influences this is where the care of another human being comes in and you will hear from Annie how parental care continues to sculpt further brain development until the child turned young adult can care for himself let me take you back to your own childhood not many of us will remember our experiences in our mother's womb but what do you remember about your childhood no doubt we will all have some good and some bad memories but most of them will be about the way we were parented rather than about our genetic genetic makeup how many of us can genuinely say that we've not suffered an adverse childhood experience a show of hands usually shows that the majority of us will have suffered from at least one Robert conveniently dismisses those with these experiences as outliers but if he does then he's not in the real world this is about all of us the effects of traumatic experiences lasts whether or not they are emotional in the form of bullying or antipathy or physical or sexual or in the forms of neglect or in the form of having someone in the family with a mental illness domestic violence substance abuse divorce our experiences as children will affect us when we are pregnant and have an effect on the unborn child and we come up that father's off the hook here either recent studies have shown that paternal environmental and nutritional factors also affect the phenotype of the offspring by altering its genome I have shown that a mother's history of adverse childhood aneesa's predicts problems in the next generation by antenatal depression very recent studies are showing that epigenetic markers can be transmitted through two generations the children's children in the Dutch hunger famine have the same low birth weight despite their mothers normal food and calorie intake but as Annie will tell you the good news is that positive experiences in early life of the newborn can build resilience and protect him or her from the effects of trauma let me end by asking another question what do we want for ourselves and for our children most of us would say that we want to be happy and that we want our children and grandchildren to be happy perhaps we should learn from the toda tribal tribal group in southern India their fundamental principle is that success should be judged not by statistics or the amount of money earned but by the quality of human character I would not be standing here today based on my polygenic score for debating it is the care that I've received from my parents the way that my father got me as the shy little girl to practice speaking aloud in order that I could take part in a play and from my three children yes parenting can go in both directions how else would I have learnt to be a risk taker I certainly did not get that from my parents as my children can testify it is my experience of being parented and of being a parent this made a difference and showed me that parenting does matter and does make a difference I urge you to vote against the motion [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] that's great well I imagine many people are feeling firmly back on the hook for me it's extremely close different data sets extremely compelling arguments our next speaker is also speaking for the motion Stewart Richie is a lecturer in the social genetic and developmental psychiatry Center at King's College London his research focuses on intelligence and cognitive abilities using genetics and brain imaging and other methods to shed light on why some people are smarter than others the people in this room presumably thanks to it good evening thanks very much for coming along and thanks to intelligence squirt for inviting me along tonight um parenting does matter but it doesn't matter as much as you think the effects of parenting have been hugely oversold I think we still live to some extent in the shadow of of Sigmund Freud who dreamed up all these arcane theories of how even you know seemingly innocuous acts by the parents could have a really grave effect on their children's life outcomes and my favorite example being he theorized that at least in some cases children's asthma was caused by them overhearing their parents having sex and imitating the heavy breathing that they heard attacked that's true that's not made up that's true well it was made up by Sigmund Freud it wasn't made up by me and and so despite this kind of absurdity we still follow Freud in making that assumption that parenting matters a great deal just listen to any celebrity interview on you know discs or a biography or autobiography of a notable person you'll see lots of discussion of parenting and all these assertions about how their parenting had had a very long term effect on them and we to wrists resist the urge to to jump from anecdotes like that to their conclusions about how much parenting matters in general and this assumption that said that the differences between people are caused by differences in their parenting and it's been called the the nurture assumption by Judith rich Harris in her book in 1998 it's so pervasive that it even affects the research of scientists who should really know better and take for instance a study just published a couple of weeks ago in the journal social science research The Guardian brought this up in their headline was growing up in a house full of books is a major boost to literacy and numeracy and in the study across several countries children who did better at school tended to be from homes that were that were full of books so more books better great but there's a gigantic flaw as Robert was saying in his speech with this kind of research not only was this just a correlational study and a non experimental trial that randomly assigned children to homes of different library sizes which probably wouldn't get past the the old ethics board but it did miss an extremely important source of similarity between parents and children and that is their genes parents don't just socialize their children into a love of reading and learning bright their parents both have more books at home and tend to have brighter children and that's because they have passed on a genetic tendency the tendencies to be smarter more inquisitive more academically inclined and are all really all linked in part to genetics and indeed the behavior geneticist Eric Turk Homer has called this the first law of behavior genetics that is all human traits are to some extent heritable and forgetting the first law when you're doing research is says it's pretty mortifying and that study about books in the home didn't even mention the possibility that genetics might explain some of the reason I even did like ctrl-f genetics on the paper and there was nothing that there's nothing in there but as I said this is a very very common mistake in in in research any study as Robert said that report a correlation between some parenting behavior on the one hand and some child outcome on the other and that doesn't take into account the effects of genetics is for all practical purposes and useless with only a few exceptions um and to be completely clear I'm not saying that the research shows parenting has no effects at all indeed if you do the proper studies the ones that can control for genetics through twin studies adoption studies and so on and you do find potential parenting effects for a few outcomes like educational attainment and so on and and there are even some new results I should say that imply we might be overestimating the genetic effects on some traits like education and there's certainly nothing in this kind of research that supports anything like genetic determinism or any of those other scary terms but the broad conclusion from this kind of research is is pretty clear within the normal range of things parents do so outside of neglect and abuse and so on parenting traits sorts of pains appearing effects on traits like intelligence and personality and so on and disorders like depression and schizophrenia can be scientifically described as small to teeny-tiny and so whereas parenting might matter somewhat for some of these outcomes and it doesn't matter anywhere near as much as people assume and we don't really even need fancy genetic behavior genetic studies to to know that parenting can't be all that important but there's a common observation from parents who have multiple children that each individual child shows very different behavioral tendencies from a very early age and that's backed up by research where siblings don't correlate unless they're identical twins don't correlate all that strongly on on on most outcomes of interest and in fact was a recent study that asked people to estimate the extent to which traits like your eye color your intelligence your depression levels and so on we're due to environments or genetics and and the people who made the most accurate guesses we're mothers with more than one child and and so a common response on hearing this kind of argument is well okay if what you're saying is true and parenting only has small effects and how maybe I shouldn't bother doing nice things for my child like care like music lessons and ballet classes and reading them at night and so on but that would be to completely miss the point you should do all these things not because the thing you think that they'll build will shape your child's life outcomes it's because they're inherently valuable music and dance and literature are some of the best and most interesting things that humans do and getting your child into them needn't be contingent on whether you think it'll add a few IQ points and that's before we get into the truly eye watering arrayed of parenting fads and trends that pop up and disappear baby wearing hock housing Tiger parenting setback education elimination communication helicopter parenting attachment parenting detachment parenting free-range kids quality time the family bed movement baby Mozart baby yoga mindfulness for kids great growth mindset paleo diets and even something and I hesitate to even mention this called orgasmic childbirth and the reason the reason that all these the reason that all these kind of fly-by-night trends and fads are so short-lived is very simple it's because they're all pretty much useless at changing the way children turn out and these are things which dare I say middle-class parents get into because essentially all the basics are covered their child will probably do fine either way but what about but what about children or about children who don't have the basics covered this is where parenting really can matter so for the minority of children who are at high risk of conduct disorder so you know problems with disruptive and anti-social behavior there really is experimental evidence from meta analyses that shows the interventions that teach parents to be more responsive and set limits and so on and really can have at least a moderate effect at least in the short term on their children's behaviors and and we also know another way of of improving the outcomes of at-risk children and that's alleviating poverty there's good experimental evidence from economics that reducing poverty via things like tax credits and cash transfers and so on and can have a positive effect on children's outcomes even in the long term and it's possible though not certain that that parenting is actually the mechanism by which that of those have their effects so to conclude we substantially overestimate the importance of parenting and particularly within the normal range of parents and behaviors and many people even scientists who do this for a living forget about the effects of genetics and and just to echo what Robert said most parents should relax and feel less anxious about the long term effects they might be having on their child and they should also feel less guilty about not engaging in one of those parenting fads that I listed and have more than likely zero benefits for how their children will turn out and that's it we do need to do more work to examine how parenting might affect kids who are at high genetic or environmental risk for psychiatric or behavioral problems so as Steven Pinker has argued children aren't just blank slates or lumps of clay that we can shape and mold in any way we wish and if we understand that normal range parenting has at best modest effect we can focus less on trying to force children's lives down a particular path and more on treating them and enjoying their company as fellow human beings thank you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] Stewart thank you very much and I would urge anyone who has the choice to choose free range kids every time it's also nice to know that control F shortcut I imagine if you get nothing else from tonight that's pretty helpful I don't know about you I feel like a cat chasing a laser pointer I am being yanked back and forth extremely persuasive arguments but I'm sure we will hear more persuasive arguments from our final speaker um and Pleshette Murphy is a therapist and a parenting counselor she was the parenting correspondent for ABC TV's Good Morning America and she was the host of parenting perspectives with an Pleshette Murphy on ABC now her books include the seven state the seven stages of motherhood loving your life without losing your mind which is surely what we're all trying to achieve and she serves on the board of and was in fact previously the board president of zero to three the leading American organization dedicated to promoting the well-being of infants and toddlers [Music] um thank you sand and good evening sorry before I begin Stuart your mother would like you to call her right out of the bag well one of the disadvantages of going last is that what you thought you were going to hear from the proponents of this motion was not what I heard at all and in fact having read Roberts book several times I'll tell you that he's a little bit of a wolf in sheep's clothing tonight because a lot of what he is advocating wasn't aired and maybe it will be when we debate because as Susan made clear parenting matters even before a baby is born but one of the things that the other side of the house believes is that you can actually shape your child's future based on their apologetic score which didn't come up the genetics matters so much that basically they're saying that everything you do as a parent you can pluck the child that put them somewhere else isn't going to really make a difference in who they become what we believe very strongly that while genes may provide a blueprint of who your child will become the house is built on love and no matter their polygenic score which maybe we'll hear more about or their genetic propensities or something I love to say there's single nucleotide polymorphisms children thrive in an environment of relationships particularly their attachment with the people who are likely to love them the most their parents so we agree that nature versus nurture is a false dichotomy we all know that children as Stuart said are not blobs of clay or blank slates but we will argue that even if genes account for 50% of a particular trait aggressiveness or shyness or sexual orientation how parents respond to their highly assertive or socially inhibited or gay child matters enormous Lee Robert and Stuart love big numbers believe me Roberts book is full of really impressive statistics and what they tout and actually Robert refer to this is that genetic studies are reliable and replicable unlikely and which is unstable and largely unpredictable exactly life is unsystematic idiosyncratic and serendipitous or maybe as they say outside the ivory towers of King's College happens but when life deals children a challenging hand we will argue that it is the loving hands of their parents and their carers that matters the most and on a related point Robert asked earlier well why are children even environmental siblings that has children who were adopted and then compared to biological siblings in the same family so different if they have the same parents well having the same parents doesn't mean you experience the same parenting I'm sure those of you who have more than one child will remember that baby number one if the dummy fell on the floor you boiled it and sterilized it and by baby number three or four he was lucky if you so much as licked it off before you popped it back in his mouth parental relationships are not static they changed and they evolved but they always matter finally we believe that Robert believes that the genetic gene emai be out of the bottle but that encouraging parents to rely on polygenic scores or on what they can learn about their child's genetics scores in shaping their children's futures is absurd so let me start with our central point that DNA may provide the blueprint but that the house is built on love how many of you are parents okay I would say most of the audience so I want you to imagine a time when you were engaged with a face with your baby and some kind of face-to-face interaction maybe we're feeding her or bathing him or just plain and your eyes meet and you gaze into your baby's face and your baby coos or goals or smiles and you say oh hello there you're happy today what are you trying to tell me and your baby responds by cooing or smiling or dribbling some peach puree down her chin this is what we call a serve and return interaction it's like a tennis game and it's unbelievably important in building those neural pathways that Susan described earlier and we know this because neuroscientists can now look at the electrical activity in the brains of young children when they're fully awake and interacting with others and we also know what happens when young children do not get this kind of serve and return interaction or attention or responsiveness babies raised in environments of stress or deprivation and they're not outliers will show far less activity in key areas of their brain particularly the prefrontal cortex which is the kind of air traffic control center of the brain that's critical to social-emotional development and learning relationship build the brain in other ways if you imagine a time let's say less happy time when your child's having a meltdown and Waitrose or screaming from this cot at 3 o'clock in the morning and you respond when you do that you provide a sense of security a buffer from stress and you send the critical message it's okay I'm here you can trust your environment and as hundreds of studies have shown children who are blessed with positive healthy relationships with their primary caregivers are better able to read other people's feelings and able to control their own they are able to cooperate to form friendships to experience increased self-confidence and to learn and this is not Freudian theory this is very current research so put simply it is the experience of knowing and being known by another person someone who's there someone who is just crazy about you that contributes to the social-emotional the cognitive the moral and even the physical development of children so Robert and Stewart can make a very impressive case for the heritability of intelligence and school attainment and also a host of psychological problems but I want to tell you a story that I'd love to share with parents who come with behavioral questions about their kids it actually comes from the same research that Robert referred to in terms of that documentary these are twins who were separated at birth and race in different families and the mothers of toddler girls were interviewed and one of the mothers said everything's fine but her eating habits are driving me crazy she won't eat anything I give her potatoes and give her all those things talk love she won't eat anything unless I put cinnamon on it it's just driving me crazy the other mother no problem no complaints oh she eats everything she said of course I have to put cinnamon on it so same genes same love of cinnamon but in one household this genetic propensity caused a lot of stress a lot of conflict in the other no big deal I would argue that matters a lot to how these children are going to be brought up or to use an example from Roberts book and I quote what if you found out that one of your children has a low score for educational attainment which is quite possible regardless of how high your polygenic score it makes sense to go with the grain rather than against it he then advises that you cut your losses and not waste money on higher education that doesn't suit them so let's imagine parents are told when their child is 2 or 3 or 8 that little Rupert is just never gonna pass as GCSEs why wouldn't they just shrug their shoulders and say what's the point of reading them books in fact why don't we just take them out of that lovely school and get them some vocational training fast well I would argue that whatever these parents are gonna save on educational fees they're gonna pay for in Rob and Rupert's therapy and actually I'm not joking because labels are limiting their unhelpful and their hurtful and is particularly wrong to label children it's wrong to label anyone based on apologetic risk score that has very low level of predictive power if the current scores can generate and finally the other of the side of the house asserts that genetics are not antithetical to equal opportunity Stuart alluded to this quite the opposite they say that if we control for environmental factors such as privilege and Prejudice genetic differences will account for more of the variance in school achievement and employment well that does sound fair but according to a recent article in the New Statesman we are living in a country where income inequality is the highest of any European nation the gap between the very rich and the very poor is the largest of any industrialized nation in the world other than the US and if last time I checked we were heading in the direction so are we really meant to believe that socioeconomic status the health and well-being of parents has no impact on children what about that little girl who might have apologetics core would predispose are the loving books as Stewart was indicating what is she supposed to do if her parents can't afford to buy books or if she's going to school hungry every day so in summary we believe that parental love matters especially in the early years when it shapes the brain genes matter but even if they account for 70% of a trait like intelligence the remaining 30% can't make 100% of the difference and last encouraging parents to rely on genetic data to guide their child-rearing practices which is what's being advocated by the other side is ludicrous because you cannot draw a direct line from genes to behavior especially for something as complex as intelligence so in concluding I would just say rather than advocating the use of children's genetic data by parents or educators why don't we invest in programs that are proven to give children the best possible start in life and support their parents especially those living and challenging circumstances I urge you to vote against this motion thank you [Music] [Applause] [Music] well this is a very exciting moment in the evening first of all I should say thank you very much all of you those who are totally compelling [Applause] [Music] we're at a very exciting moment of evening because we have the results of the initial vote you voted when you came in and what's lovely is that Roberts do have some work to do because for the motion was 17% to the start against the motion was 66% of the start so even if you convert the 17% undecided you still don't have enough people so you're gonna have to drag some people who really believe that parenting is important and persuade them that it's not which is love me you're the the kind of terrifying wave of hands that went up makes me very very keen to get to your questions we we would like very very quick rebuttals if you don't mind but if you could really limit it to a few quick focused remarks just to rebuttal anything that you you you want to get to and I'm going to give you the opportunity and then we will throw it open to your interrogation okay thanks well there's plenty to say but um I guess I would point to a couple of problems that we were having in the in in the scientific literature recently that I think explain quite a lot of the issues that that certainly that you raised about epigenetics and so on and we're in the middle of right now in in in science what's been called the replication crisis where there are many many studies that are published with tiny samples with incompetent statistics with with some some fraudulent some biased and named in many ways it has been shown very very very clearly and unfortunately the world of human transgenerational epigenetic inheritance is one of those areas that has an awful lot of very small very inconsistent very biased studies and there's a great article online by by the biologists the geneticist kevin mitchell that shows that the critiques a lot of these studies and shows that really we can't we're not at the point right now where we can conclude anything about transgenerational epigenetic inheritance in humans now it definitely does happen in plants and i believe it happens in worms as well but but but the evidence in humans is extremely and and so um stacking that kind of stuff up the epigenetic stuff up against a hundred years of really solid behavior genetic evidence um it's really weak ant you know to say Oh genetic scores have a small effect and so on epigenetic studies are not talking about massive effects either oh can I can I cut you off there I know we're gonna get more from you Robert dude but I'm just I'm keen to get to the question so do you want to add a couple of things well I don't there was a lot of agreement in a way a having we're all for love having kids have a good time you know enjoying their childhood that's sort of my message too but I think that will happen better if we recognize and respect the individual differences you mentioned having more than one child is a great saying that parents are environmentalists until they have more than one child because after the fact you can explain anything about why your daughter's shy for example but then when the second one is different because shyness is one of the more heritable traits in infancy you say I didn't do that you begin to recognize that they're very different so that that's one issue and the other issue is Annie was going on about the polytechnics course you notice I didn't mention that that's the second half of my book and I thought in ten minutes I would focus on the first half which is about the basic twin and adoption research that shows the importance of genetic influence but it is very exciting that the DNA revolution is beginning to find some of the DNA differences that account for heritability but you shouldn't really turn that around to say oh you're only explaining a tiny percent of variance with these polygenic scores I think the point for us about parents making a difference or not has to do with those twin and adoption studies that have collected data over a century showing that genetics accounts for about half of the difference which means the differences but half of the differences are environmental but it's not those shared family environmentally call nurture and include parenting Thank You Susan are you happy to offer your rebuttal yes thank you I want to say that I am a clinician and as a clinician I have seen many many people who have suffered from mental ill-health and I know and I'm working with mothers in the postpartum and in pregnancy I want to give one message that these are not outliers and although we talk about adverse childhood experiences actually I think if I asked you to raise your hands and I gave you the list which I won't do but you can find it online I think that as I said before most people will say that they have suffered at least one the we are not outliers I'm not an outlier and working with women clinically has shown me that we actually do need to support them and we can't leave it to their genetics and if I have one message to give to the government it's that we recognize the importance of the pregnancy period and that we give mothers and fathers maternity and paternity leave in pregnancy as well as postpartum Thank You Susan and [Applause] I you know I guess I would just say that the idea that you're not saying that genes are deterministic is blyde by the title of the book if DNA is a blueprint it's then you know you're not going to don't have a blueprint for a house and then end up with a boat the implication is that genes do make us who we are that's why that's basically the message of your book and I think that what we really have to keep in mind is that as you showed on that graph that and I'm not a geneticist but you know what I did learn from your book is that when we talk about heritability we're talking about populations we're describing populations and differences within populations is that right so we're not really talking about individuals but parenting we don't parent variables we parent people and there's just so much I of course agree with you that we shouldn't force children to be something they aren't but actually saying that there's a 70% you know you can look at their intelligence scores and it's a point 7 that they're not let's say gonna be as clever as you'd like and then actually labeling them not so clever is really bad parenting and is going to have a very negative effect on children so that that's the difference yes working with what's good about them is great but I think it's naive to think that being labeled in a family as the not so clever one is not going to have a really bad outcome for children perfect thank you so for me at least it's boiling down to do I want the stress-free life of someone who's been relegated to the role of chauffeur security yard and chef or am I prepared to sign up to the overwhelming responsibility that what I do day-to-day might actually have some serious and profound consequences for my son the most important bit is your questions I have loads of questions but we're going to throw it open to the floor um should have there we go can we get when lovely can we get number two here no you're perfect this is you're the person I want thank you that's good um I just find it interesting that both Joyce and Robert both ended their presentations by saying we should just enjoy our children and not trying interfere with you know putting on piano lessons and everything else so my question is I think just what I'm just touched on is what happens when you do interfere and you try and box them into something that they don't want to do does that not have a negative effect on them and to say that it's it's either nature or nurture it's genetics or its environmental surely there are some children for whom some can pass it off in later life and say I never you know they can make it light of the piano lessons they didn't enjoy but for those other children who felt they were a failure and they were forced to do something they really didn't like doesn't doesn't that parenting have a negative effect on them perhaps for the rest of their lives fantastic question thank you very much we've taken them in batches of three number one over here I I find I wonder where though I share a sense of a moral vacuum with a with the proposal here in that if parents are persuaded that their efforts are not going to be greatly significant they will be discouraged in what is a very difficult and demanding responsibility I have in mind the work of a Richard Witt Whitefield Birmingham into brain chemistry of neonates and the fact that their brain chemistry will show whether they have accept you know part of their nurture emotional warmth and children who do not experience need an emotional warmth in the first year of their lives find it very difficult to express emotional warmth later on that's nurture for me at work thank you very much the question is the moral vacuum are we discouraging parents and third question number four they're looking at the question from two similar point of views is a ethically and post conception we don't really have a control on the genes so shouldn't we worry about parenting which is a bit once we've chosen our mate or shock board genetic material we can't control the genetics yet so let's just keep doing the parenting lovely thank you okay so we've got a question about what happens when you do interfere is active parenting doing some harm I think you'd like to respond to that question for everyone are we creating a moral vacuum are we even by raising this question are we making people care less and maybe harming children and another question about the ethics pre-and ability to interfere in the genes um Robert Stewart can I start with you so I I just wanted to the the question there about the the brain chemistry and so on I think that research does suffer from the same problems as the epigenetic stuff I have I'm extremely skeptical of that kind of research and and it really is based on on very very flimsy evidence and we're sort of noticing that in science now and I certainly didn't argue that we just shouldn't do piano lessons and so on in fact I argue that we should it's just that we shouldn't expect them to be improving our children's intelligence sort of personality or whatever Amster be I certainly think that there there can be in some cases negative effects but I think you would have to show that right you would have to show me some evidence that am not liking piano lessons turns people into or a different person and then the otherwise would have been and I don't think there is any such evidence and shouldn't we worry about parenting because we can't or the genes well we're seeing the effects of parenting are are much much smaller than people than people think the outside environment things like alleviating poverty in society is what we should be looking at not trying to tell people to do free range parenting or all the other lists of ridiculous things I that I mentioned and the point that we're making is not genes matter so the environment you know we don't even care about the environment it's that we need to find the things in the environment that do matter and parenting doesn't really seem to be one of them Susan and anchors I said to you well I mean obviously we're all in favor of alleviating poverty for one of the reason one of the reasons is because a lot of children are living in poverty and I think that their parents are you know putting up with situations as Susan says the Aces research or the idea that you can just kind of consider abuse or neglect or poverty or some of the other socio-economic issues that families face as outliers that's not what we're considering here in the research I think it's just you know I think that this is really misleading because I actually don't think that that's what you've been saying you said several times if you of these people aren't outliers and so on do you mean that in a statistical sense do you mean that do you mean that do you mean the people who are at the end of the distribution are not are not outliers because they are right they are right maybe we could show her hat have a show of hands of the number of people who feel that they have been bullied at some point in their life and what does that show it's it's one of the adverse childhood experiences yeah well but you can ask people about all sorts of things the point is that the only the things that people the things that people care about in terms of there's adverse experiences that have effect are when you have scores of a dozen points on that scale right not where it's an arbitrary point at which you draw the way of course but but it's not that everyone has one the whole point is people differ in their experiences and their their personalities and their and so on but but but it's it's way old olds up to the point that it has an effect and what we're seeing is those are people who are the outliers that's something we need to think about obviously but but to say anyone who has any experience that's been negative at all in their life is you know that that's that's apparently disproves the effect of genetics or something does it not help us that we have a parent who can support us when we come home from school and been bullied surely that parenting is important to help us through these difficult circumstances you'd have to show me the evidence of that can I cut the comical on Robert here I would just say that if 90% of the people here had an adverse experience it goes against your argument in a way because these are obviously well-adjusted people that's how you sell a lot of books okay can we get three more questions please number one I'd like to ask the against team by what mechanism do you think post birth parenting predominantly works is it through molding neural plasticity or is it by influencing gene expression and for the pro team I'd like to know have you either if you try to account for epigenetics in any way and the influence of the microbiome and the immune system on gene expression Oh lovely meaty questions thank you number three hi-yah question for the team as well but actually to everyone I think one of the things she has been a lot of agreement on is really quite a romantic idea that we all have these abilities within us waiting to be unleashed and we shouldn't be boxing children in I think as someone said so I think you know Robert you finished by saying we we need to find out what children like to do and encourage them to do that Stewart you said you know you need to find out the things you're interested in and and push down that path and similarly I think and you said we shouldn't force people to be something they're not so you've all agreed on this idea that we have this intrinsic thing with inner cities what we are but I just want to explore that a bit more to a certain extent I agree I totally accept that you know maybe with 100-meter sprint a large part of your ability to sprint 100 meters is going to be genetic but what about interests and interests for me are just as important if not more important than ability if I just take you know much I'm not a trivial example but I really love cricket and football if I've been adopted my American parents have a brilliant no I wouldn't love cricket and football because it's not on the telly you know people that they don't even my age we're not watching it as much you can tell that's very trivial that doesn't matter I just can I ask you to the question is what about interests interests really matter in life and surely our parents must determine our interests it's why not put the interesting it's not so bad to put some interesting genetic module within us they're gonna get to it they'll get to it thank you thank you very much number two thank you I have two adopted children and both of them received no love no attention from in the womb to until there were two but I think you can expand this to other children unfortunately lots of children do not receive love and attention in the first two years of their life so my question for the panel is are they doomed because they never got the nurturing love they needed to get at the beginning or if I got lucky with the lottery of their biological children I'm just fine and I can relax because if they got good parents they're gonna be superstars [Music] [Applause] an amazing range of questions there from the deeply personal this is this is usually what there's a lot of stake to the very specific scientific mechanisms and the the intuitive role of what our parents do for us can I this time start with Susan and Anna well actually two of us two really important questions this issue of sort of neural molding and how much after the baby is born I mean the brain is incredibly plastic and the first few years of life so I would say to you that actually what you are doing with the babies no matter what kinds of early experiences they had will make a huge difference we see this from things like the Romanian orphan studies and these are controlled studies where the children who were put into foster care after they had been institutionalized for a few years were almost indistinguishable from children who had grown up in homes that had not been adopted these are the kids who were institutionalized at they'll you know 200,000 of them were in institutions in Romania so there's lots of evidence that shows that what you do as a parent makes a big difference and I would say that that's a response to your question there's no question and I'm sure Robert and Stewart would agree that there's plenty of evidence that what we do as parents makes a huge difference that's really our point I would say that the interest question is very important I think you know how you are raised what God you worship doesn't that have an effect on who we are that has nothing to do with genes and there are lots of other things that make us who we are and you know that that have nothing again to do with our genetic propensity but actually the issue of forcing children to do things this is not good parenting and we would all agree that we don't want to force children into doing things that they don't want to do well maybe but the whole interest thing is that is is is really important and as pet as as parents we should look at our children and work with them in that relationship to determine what is in their best interests and work together in that relationship so I feel like we're giving a very strong case that there is a sort of intuitive experience or belief that from from what sports we play to to where we were we where we worship is deeply shaped by our parents and those are things that we feel quite profoundly about can you can you respond to some of those issues and and maybe also there's a scientific question I'd like to first speak to the Romanian study because that's done by my colleague professor Michael Rutter and that is way out of the normal range of deprivation I mean those kids weren't even touched by people they were left alone you know in soiled diapers it's the worst sort I mean you'd be arrested if you did that as a parent but the point that he's made after all these years is those kids have turned out pretty well despite that horrendous first two years of life so it seems to me it goes against your argument but no but that's because of the the ones who've done pretty well are the ones who were given you know opportunities to be moved into foster care are not the ones who stayed in the institutions and in fact the input the point is that because they were you know this was a natural experiment unformed thank God we don't have too many of those but the indications were that these children because they weren't loved they were fed many of them were fed and clothed but what was missing was love and it caused major problems on all levels physical emotional psychological and it does go against the idea though of the like the sensitive the very sensitive period in the first few years of life that everyone talks about if that's the case right why does it go against well because as Robert said if these kids turned out they were not adopted out who's against the no they were not okay unfortunately if it was after a certain period of time they never recovered well we could probably disagree yeah and can I can I just mention the epigenetics and microbiome thing um there are fads and parenting and there are fines in science as well and and those two are current fads in science I think it's completely fine to look into that stuff but it's really important but we do not have anything like the level of clear data on on epigenetics microbiome and all that stuff than we do on on behavior genetics then the question was then what is is there a mechanism of post birth parenting you're saying no it's not that it's not I'm saying no it's them saying we don't know yet and we shouldn't be afraid to say in some scientific questions we don't know I also don't think we should overstate the case and hype up the case for things like epigenetics because we really don't know the answer yet and there's an awful lot of hype in science and we need to and we need to we need to we need to stop making things up can we get can we get two more we've got time for I think two let's get three more questions go on in number one Stewart you mentioned about the studies of children with conduct problems and you'd said obviously there is some evidence there that kind of supports that that makes a difference intervention so that would be working with parents teaching them to do things like one two one time Priya's curtain implies consequences and binder eases what things that people traditionally think of as good parenting and I was just wondering what your thoughts were regarding that number three hello I'm sure I'm not the first to observe that the two speakers for the motion a male and the two speakers against emotion a female and I'm just wondering how much of this is to do the fact that and this is a gross generalization but traditionally women or mothers tend my very careful that tend to be the more nurturing parenting roles I think that's I think you phrased that question very elegantly and if you hadn't asked it I would have done thank you and number four I have a question I have a question for the four team how do they know that that data's not completely biased based on the fact that people had to volunteer to be a part of these Twin Cities doesn't this predetermine the data and also I've got a point on outliers is that the outliers are wherever you are in the statistical data is outliers if you want to count them as outliers so as they're interested in not normal children there's an outliers Oh lovely thank you very much these are fantastic questions these are this is a difficult topic very sensitive for many people and I'm very grateful to all our speakers for handling it so sensitively Robin Stuart can you start maybe respond to that they're working with working with parents the one-to-one things um but but gender and agenda and outliers seems to me I'm particularly curious about the gender one we seem to have genes that make us believe that we matter as parents even if we even if we don't so I wonder if you could respond first of all to which question now welter or if you gather up whichever whichever bits of response you want to offer us well we tried hard to improve the gender balance at least it is two males and two females and then sand I don't and none of us can help our gender but you know I'm a parent I have five kids depending on how you count so I don't know I mean how much of the variance is explained by gender in terms of nurturance and loving your children I would I would not be very pleased if someone told me because I'm a male oh I can't love my children but do you think maybe men care a little bit men want to believe that they are less influential parents than they might be I feel more - I feel more drawn towards your but but possibly because fatherhood is different to motherhood mm-hmm I don't know it goes beyond the question of genetics though doesn't it yeah okay hopefully people can respond to our points hopefully pick another you know respond to the points we're making in terms of you know with a rational analysis of the scientific point so we're making rather than whether we're male or female hopefully we're beyond or beyond that I think that the the question about you know the the flaws and the research and again I am NOT a geneticist but there's no question it's not just that their volunteer volunteered but I would wonder if zan you know twins are raised very differently identical twins are raised very differently in families than dizygotic twins they're often treated like they're dressed the same they have similar friends so there's flaws in the research on that basis you can't really compare them to families where they're not when they're not identical twins that's one thing the other thing is that I mean I made a note here that most of the genetic research is done on so-called weird populations Western white educated industrialized rich and democratic that to me also excused the data yeah well I just might say that I agree with the second point disagree with the first so the first point has been explicitly tested you can and there are cases of mistaken identity when some parents think that they're identical twins are actually fraternal twins and vice versa and you still and you still well you deliberately you you you get those feelings you experiment and you find that once you're controlling for that you basically find the same effects this would say so that's not really a problem and the weird thing the way educated industrialized stuff completely agreed but that's a problem that we have across all psychological research not just not just in in twins so so it's a problem that we have in psychological research including the stuff that's been brought up by the other side of the debate maybe I should just answer that but my own research has actually taken a cross-section of well it's a long attitudinal study but it's children brought up in the born women pregnant in to inner-city GP surgeries and I don't think that there's anything about those as outliers when you were born in Lambeth or in Thamesmead but maybe you think those are I don't think that I think it's not necessarily the rote layers but I think that's our study that's genetically confounded right so we don't we can't if we find the correlation between a parenting behavior and a child outcome it's genetically confirmed so we can't actually tell whether it was due to parenting or genetics so that's the problem with that kind of study we do have time for a couple more questions although the microphones that mic friends are still out can we grab a couple more number one have you got a question ready perfect thank you um one thing that'd be helpful is if you guys could each kind of tell us what you define as parenting because it seems like the fore side is saying parenting is don't contort yourself with you know all these extra things like the latest fad parenting whereas the again side is saying don't neglect your children and I think everybody might agree with that you're just coming it'd be helpful to say what are you talking about when you're saying parenting matters and it doesn't matter thank you very much lovely and number three hi can I start by saying I'm I'm actually genuinely surprised how much I think you were both arguing the same but I won't ramble don't worry my question is a lot of my family and friends who are well-read not me often mention the issue of peers in this discussion which I'm surprised hasn't come up in this conversation and from what I've heard I've heard this general bantering of 50% genetics 25% parenting 25% peers what do you guys have to say about the influence of peers fantastic is there a third question over here thank you I had a question for and Pleshette Murphy you said and I think I'm quitting what we do as parents makes a huge difference if that's the case how do you account for these research findings from these twin and adoption studies we've heard quite a lot about this evening if it's true that what we do as parents makes a huge difference had you account for the fact that siblings raised in the same household are as different as siblings raised in different households you said it's because when we parent even siblings in the same household would treat the siblings slightly differently yes that's probably true but we can't possibly treat them as differently as an entirely different set of parents would treat two siblings separated at birth so how do you account for the fact that not only to sibs brought up separately eras different to each other as to sibs raised together but more importantly in neither view of addressed this how do you account for the research findings of all these twins that have been brought up separately separated at birth and brought up by different families they turn out to be it turns out almost identical in spite of being raised differently if parenting makes such a big difference which you seem to think and that's your side of the argument how do you account for these research going times you're gonna get that it's good I tell you what for those of you that think this is a false dichotomy sitting in my chair I can feel the heat coming off each side it is not some it is not that at all so first of all defining parenting I'd love to hear from everyone on that and then talk about peers and finally come to your specific challenge there can we start with you two defining parenting well I've studied parenting in many different ways observational studies videotaped interactions between children so I've used all the methods to study parenting that anyone has used I've had large-scale studies with developmental psychologists etc so I'm defining parenting in terms of the measures that people are using there's two major factors you know it's a warmth dimension and a control discipline sort of factor so we're just using measures that other people use and call parenting so in terms of peers oh sorry did you want to well I'd like just to add that there is no word in the English well there is now but the word parenting doesn't exist in fact there isn't a verb to parent if you look back in the English in the English dictionary in the past and actually it rather negates the meaning of a parent who is actually a man or a woman in an undeniable and relationship with a child by reason of a biological fact and I think that I personally would want to call that parental care and not parenting I often wonder why we don't blame the children more and talk about offspring we're all here worrying about this what are they doing what are they thinking about are they having their own debates that's a lovely definition thank you can you talk I will I will call back back and forth can you talk about peers yeah I think yeah you know this great topic peers it's interesting how much we focused on the family but if the environmental influences are those that make kids in a family different then as Judith mr. Harris said a long time ago why aren't we studying things outside the family beginning with peers but this happens to be a debate on parenting it's important I think it's important to note that just to say again if it wasn't clear that the environment we're talking about it's not just parenting right there's there's what we call the shared environment so what makes in the same family similar to each other and what we call the non-shared environment so what makes children different and nobody here denies any large effects of the the non-shared environment the non zero varmint is through whatever reasons and and some people think it's idiosyncratic and sort of random and some people think there are factors in there there is this big environmental effect so so nothing's nothing's you know even close to a hundred percent of genes even if parenting is only having a very small effect and can you talk about peers and then talk very specifically about how you how you would rebuttal deal with the data that roberts you had presented well i mean i think that one of the things that first of all somebody said we're not really at odds it's quite the month way that maybe this was advertised and i think that's true because i think a lot of what is in the book has not been aired here and i i think that you know one of the things that's not been said is that basically i'm understanding that the robert and stewart believe that there are lots of psychological traits and intelligence issues and school attainment that can be explained by genes not by parenting and that's where we differ that's why i wanted to be here today because I care very much and I do think that there is such a thing as good enough parenting I do think that of course it's culturally relative because I think what we consider a good parent in this culture may be very different than in others but you know my answer to what you know what do we mean and what do I feel is good enough parenting is parenting that recognizes that children need love but they also need limits that you know that parents who are there they're responsive they're empathic there are lots of variables and robert has done some wonderful work on studying what good parenting looks like SS sues and I don't know about Stewart but maybe you have to and the the last the last question was specifically about that you know that there does seem to be and maybe it's it's literally that I'm a little bit familiar with just cuz I'm a twin I hear it a lot that there are these examples and datasets that really seem to suggest that raised in wildly different environments individuals can turn out very very similar how do you how do you account for that or what how do you respond to that well I mean actually I really feel I should defer to Robert on this because in fact one of the things he started off by saying is that 50% of our genes have you know are contributed by our parents but you know the other 50% is how we're parenthood or how we have or what our friendships are like or in Roberts case you had somebody as a professor as I remember in your story who plucked you who basically made you write that application for a graduate school that would not you know you might not have been here if it hadn't been for certain people and this is true particularly for children who grow up in hard situations where there's often one person a coach or a priest or a friend or a neighbor if the parents aren't there for them who makes a huge difference and I would agree with whoever asked the question that we can't just look at parents in terms of twin studies I mean I think that first of all the number of situations like that documentary showed are very rare because it's not done anymore we don't separate identical twins and have them adopted of you know in other families but when we do look at the twin studies again what we're seeing and this is probably why we're not disagreeing very much is that it is both I mean we're not saying that you're a blob of clay and that the only thing that influences you is you know is your parenting but in fact the reason that kids are different in families is because a they're different when they arrive and be I would argue that parents relationships too number one two or three are very different I mean to someone's point you know parents raise their children raise their parents as much as parents raise their children Susan you had a comment about men yeah yes I [Laughter] that's arising really in response to the person over there that said she'd noticed that there were two women on this side and two men on this side so I just wanted to say that well I wondered whether it was something to do with the fact that that men feel that their role as a parent ends at fertilization and I want to say to you men out there you've heard the arguments your children need you more than just your genes and they need you we need you as mothers and we need you and you are as important as the women so please don't feel that we're ignoring you by just these events are not called intelligent squared for no reason I've just been handed a very pleasing note that says let's skip the closing statements the questions are so good so sorry about your closing statements but since you've since most of you have voted in the vote is now being counted we don't need closing statements we could just enjoy the feast of soul and flow of reason if the microphones are still out there does anyone have any more questions get your hands up and we can we can draw on them we've got number two coming in here number one is that is there somebody ready to go lovely let's call a number one hi can you can you tell me how much you think parenting matters in percentages from each side thank you lovely clear clear clear question number two as as a as a parent to a Rupert and analyser who Shops at Waitrose I thought I'd arity yeah I'm brother verlan and I'm I'm a sport playing rugby loving academic who went to university but isn't conscientious but I married somebody who is conscientious didn't go to university and doesn't like sport am I covered on all bases do I have to do [Applause] [Music] that's very nice this is the third question over here I think we heard a lot of a strong evidence evidence-based the argument against but my question for a prenatal period I just wonder is that really parenting because I would say this is part of nature rather than nurture lovely question thank you very much okay very quickly teams I want percentages then I want to know if you're choosing your partner just get the opposite person to you does that solve it we don't need to have the debate then and a prenatal period quick quick because then we've got the answers the vote so quick responses starting with Robyn's chair okay fifty percent of the variance is not genetic it's do the environment but how much of that is due to specified parental affects I can come up with a few cases where it's maybe 10% but on average I'd say it's less than 5% you've already ready just a slightly bit of these things differ across the lifespan so there are larger parenting effects earlier and lifespan for something like intelligence than there are later and as Rover said there are some traits that have larger effects than that so things like education has a larger shared environmental effect than than something like intelligence or or or height or something like that or or indeed psychopathology yeah lovely but we've got 5% do you want to give a number I'm afraid you're not going to get a number out of me I think it's the false dichotomy I go I mean obviously genetics is important and only it accounts for a lot but I think that of course parenting the the epigenetic effect is affecting the gene so I don't think that we can quite I can give you a percentage I don't know can i push you for number n well yeah I mean I would save just the opposite I would say that I would say parenting accounts for probably huge a percentage or I put it another way I think it's that 8020 rule I mean if you know if something can be explained by ATP genetic predisposition accounts for 80% of a particular trait to me the 20% can make all the difference it's not that you can't weight it equally in my opinion in terms of what matters as far as the quality of a child's life I mean and I would only say that if you like the research and it sounds compelling by Roberts book but don't support the motion that's very that's very good solving partner choice but in either case whether whichever side you fall off on part of the choice should you just be choosing someone wildly different to you can you talk about that any anything about partner choice yeah it's an interesting area of genetic research actually but on the whole spouses don't made it so totally as much as people think but it has some interesting genetic consequences but on average the most important thing for parents to remember is that children are only 50% chips off the old block and what you need to recognize is that your children are different genetically from you and each child is genetically different from the other children prenatal period is that parenting no I don't think so I don't think it matters and I don't think it can be called it can be called parenting in the same way that things like you know how you set boundaries and rules and so on and this is the sort of thing you get in parenting advice and if one if one of the strongest things I've mmm I would argue tonight is that all that stuff about parenting advice it's probably not really helping or making much of a difference there's some good ideas in there that you might want to try there's nothing to make a huge difference the way your kid turns out in terms of their intelligence and their their personality and then I'll just chuck in one very brief point which is that if people are parenting their children and differently you know we talk about you know it's not just that the same parenting occurs to every child and every child it screams to the same parenting that completely undermines all these parenting books that give you advice on how to treat your kids right these give general advice but if you're treating your kids if every every child individually then that can put them domains all that way so it's it's all of it it's all a bit of a disaster we won't end on that okay to the person who asked the question about parenting in the prenatal and in the prenatal life it goes back to my question my answer about what is parenting and if we go to what is a parent and parental care then this is about a relationship with your child and that begins at the moment of conception and both mother and father are important can't you see the weird genetic determinism obviously but but where environmental determinism too so the moment of truth what's very nice about this result before I announce it is that everyone gets a bit of a wind so remember I'm in the preview was 17% against was 66% and don't know was 17% so in the final vote for was 29% so you've dragged quite a few people up I mean you've almost doubled it there against dropped a little bit but you did carry the day with 51% and don't know we've slightly increased the amount of confusion to 20% which i think is lovely [Applause] can I thank you can I thank you all for staying so late for asking such brilliant questions and can you once again please thank our amazing speaker [Music] [Applause]

Channel: Intelligence Squared

Views: 36,679

Keywords: parenting, xand van tulleken, robert plomin, Ann Pleshette Murphy, susan pawlby, Stuart Ritchie, twins, genetics, children, nature vs nurture, DNA, genetic determinism

Id: z-a2dmosOKs

Length: 93min 53sec (5633 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 25 2019