Elliott Thomas

Mr. Stowe

English 103, Section 20

28 September 2011

Research Paper Freewrite

            Nature versus nurture in relation to human behavior has been a constant debate for many decades. After many experiments, scientist cannot seem to eliminate one or the other. Both have proven to affect human behavior. Criminal behavior is caused by genetic mishaps and certain disorders developed at birth. Environmental influences play a significant role in the development of aggressive behavior. How a person is raised determines how a gene is expressed. Criminals often cannot be blamed for their actions because their upbringing and gene expression has caused them to lose control of their behavior. Therefore, criminal behavior is determined by a combination of nature and nurture because one relies on the other for development.

            The sources I have already found are credible. The first source I found is from a neuropsychopharmacology website. It is well maintained by nature publishing group and the article is over 4 years old. It explains the complexity of nature versus nurture in respect to genes and their role. Another online source discusses experiments performed that conclude environment is essential to the development of violent behavior. The other sources support the conclusion that ones surroundings and culture shape our personalities and our gene expression. I suspect I will need some more sources that discuss the specific genes that are involved with violent behavior. Also, I would like to research specific crimes, which support environmental influences on violent behavior. Conducting an interview would be beneficial, but I think my research topic may be too complex to find someone who is fluent in this subject.

I may run into problems concerning the broadness of my topic. I have limited it to criminal behavior, not just behavior in general. If I run into problems with my topic being too broad, I may limit it, specifically, to serial killers and how nature and nurture affect their behavior. I could run into sources on nature being too complex for me to comprehend; however, this could be avoided by limiting the amount of primary sources I choose to use. I will have to thoroughly reword and generalize the information I obtain about gene functions, so that the reader can understand the facts without getting confused.