Born or Developed?

[dark]

Ok I looked with the search thing but couldn't find anything on this. Albeit I am not good with that thing.

Ok here is the question.

Are types formed at birth or do we formulate cognitive functions as we develop?

Since we cannot really change our personality and our brains work the way they d and cannot be re-wired out will, I am going to think they are set at birth, which I think if this is so, could we figure out an infants typology by deciding their dominate function through various ways of association with certain things.

I know a lot of people mention how we can choose certain functions over others, but that seems foolish in a way, if that is so why would some people choose to be as boring as ISFJs? If that was true I am sure everyone would be ENTJs or ENTPs, or maybe an ENFJ (I am sure I don't need to reason these, but I will if asked...). I am just not getting the idea of people developing the functions, it just seems more logical we are born that way since everyone experiences things and we each understand them differently, etc etc.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

We are born with genes, our brains develop and we acuire traits.

 

[Fukyo]

Depends who you ask...

Lenore Thomson asserts it's more-or less a product of the environment that isn't physiologically rooted or innate.

Spoiler

I think I'd like to start with what a psychological type isn't. I want to be up front about how I understand type theory, because otherwise what I say about it won't make much sense.

I don't believe that type refers to a person's innate personality characteristics. It isn't the causal source of a person's needs or the behaviors designed to meet them.

Rather, type is the outcome of habituated choices -- our accustomed orientation to incoming information. Of course, some of our choices are going to favor our temperament, in so far as temperament means our basic chemistry, but knowing our type won't tell us what job we're best suited to do or what kind of marriage partner we ought to seek. Type tells us how we generally adapt, particularly when a situation is unfamiliar. It tells us what we're most likely to recognize as important about a situation, what that means to us, and what strategies we use to manage it.

The universe, after all, is a blooming, buzzing, ever-changing field of information. We can't take in everything that exists. Every situation requires that we make choices. If we recognize something as important, we're setting aside other things as less important, or screening them out altogether. This isn't a sign of dysfunction. It's the way we're made. The very purpose of having a nervous system is to narrow our receptive capacity to data that ensures our comfort and survival.

From time immemorial, various temperament theories have attempted to classify human personality in these terms, assuming that people have different kinds of nervous systems, which give rise to different kinds of emotional dispositions. For example, some people enjoy risk, others seek harmony; some people want responsibility, others enjoy change. The validity of these classification systems, however, is undermined by the corollary assumption that people's behaviors issue directly from their affective needs, reflecting the natural way such needs can be met.

C. G. Jung, the analyst who came up with the theory of psychological types, objected to this assumption. He was loathe to credit people's choices entirely to affective disposition, as though people could be pegged by a label, and consciousness were an expedient illusion. He pointed out, in fact, that when our behaviors do issue from immediate needs outside our conscious control, we don't identify these actions with preference or authenticity. Rather, we feel precisely as though we're out of control. Therefore, Jung focused on the part of the psyche that is making this judgment -- the "I" that results from making free-will decisions, the choices that make us feel like "ourselves."

This is what I mean by type reflecting an accustomed adaptive orientation, even when it's not entirely compatible with a self-image or a genuine issue of temperament. To ascribe this to type falsification implies that one has an innately determined type, but I believe that type results at odds with habituated strategies can give one a very good idea of what a person is doing, right now, to adapt to a particular environment. That kind of adaptation isn't necessarily false; it may reflect choices made for the sake of an authentic ideal or principle, whose price has become too high.

As far as I'm concerned, the only aspect of type likely to reflect a person's innate disposition is what Jung referred to as the attitudes, Extraversion and Introversion. Our dominant standpoint will always reflect the attitude that comes naturally to us. However, Jung contended that the vast majority of people have only a slight preference for either, and, for these types, cultural influence plays a greater role.

I also believe that we're likely to innately prefer a left- or right-brain approach to information, which implicates the J and P attitudes in the MBTI system. [1] [2]

The proponent of the above mentioned type falsification Katherine Benzinger proposes that type is an innate energy efficient preference which correlates with which parts of the brain we prefer to use(because they are the most energy efficient for a given individual).

Personally, I agree with both views. I think type is innate, but also subject to environment and development. This development however follows a pattern that isn't entirely subject to the whims of the environment, as I explainedhere

 

[Adymus]

Many people believe your personality type develops and changes as you grow and your environment changes...










... and those people are wrong.



Cognitive functions are not just amorphous concepts that give you personality quirks. Cognitive function are critical to how we survive, experience, and make sense of reality. To put it simply, being born without any cognitive functions already set in any hierarchy would be a terrible design, because you can't actually begin learning or experiencing reality without a functional hierarchy. It would essentially be like being born a gelatonous blob of of flesh, taking different forms depending on how your environment effects, and that just simply does not occur in nature, there is always some kind of genetic design.
A human infant that did not have a set functional hierarchy would for all intents and purposes be brain dead, babies might be a little dependent, but they are certainly not dead from the neck up.

However, this is not to say that there is not still an element of nurture that does effect your personality. Your environment definitely does have an impact on how your psyche is used as well as its over all state, although the cognitive function hierarchy cannot be broken or changed.

 

[Agent Intellect]

Perhaps applying the same typology to infants is the wrong way to go about it. It would probably be more accurate to apply some sort of proto-typology to such underdeveloped brains, which have to differentiate into more mature typology the same way a blastula has to differentiate into endoderm, ectoderm, and mesoderm, which then differentiate into organ systems.

Maybe newborns (or even third trimester fetuses) have a very rudimentary personality type. This personality type has very little to do with the internal milieu of thought processes, but could be described in a more behavioralist way - the personality has more to do with how the newborn will respond to various concrete stimuli.

As the newborn continues to develop, so does it's personality, differentiating into something more complex. This would be essentially the way the infant takes in the world, and how this input influences it's upbringing. This would still be very rudimentary, as it would be more or less just the way the experiential input is processed by the developing brain, and how it affects the development of the brain. I would suggest a simple dichotomy, like the infant being either directive or adaptive (rudimentary "J" and "P" respectively). A directive infant would maybe be the kind that cries more often, getting the parents to do things for it, while the adaptive infant might be the quieter kind (but more likely to stick shit into it's mouth).

This is all just hypothetical, off the top of my head, so don't put too much stock into it's detail.

Anyway, the underlying point is that these rudimentary personality types are genetically determined, but the types of input the infant gets during development will ultimately shape it's type as we know it.

As an addendum, I think people put too much stock into the Mendelian view of type inheritance. I mentioned this on a thread a while back, but it's far more likely that each trait would be polygenic (determined by more than one gene). For instance, the judging dichotomy might be determined by 7 (arbitrary number) different alleles. If Ti dominance has a certain set of 7, then changing 1, 3, and 6 might make them Te dominant, or changing 1, 2, 4, and 5 might make them Fi dominant and so forth. It could even be that Ti might have several sets of 7 that cause the Ti phenotype. This way, even if you have a parent that's ISTJ and a parent that's ESFJ, the two could potentially produce an INTP if the correct combination of genes get passed down to the offspring.

 

[gruesomebrat]

dark, I think the thread "INTP formula" over in the INTP sub-forum is asking pretty much the same thing now. It amuses me, though, that this topic of 'nature vs. nurutre' regarding typology keeps coming up in my conversations with INTPs, both here on the forum and in other venues.

 

[Bird]

Let me help you out friend:

Jstor.org


Search to your heart's content.
I'm sure your questions will
get answered.

 

[EyeSeeCold]

Perhaps applying the same typology to infants is the wrong way to go about it. It would probably be more accurate to apply some sort of proto-typology to such underdeveloped brains, which have to differentiate into more mature typology the same way a blastula has to differentiate into endoderm, ectoderm, and mesoderm, which then differentiate into organ systems.

Maybe newborns (or even third trimester fetuses) have a very rudimentary personality type. This personality type has very little to do with the internal milieu of thought processes, but could be described in a more behavioralist way - the personality has more to do with how the newborn will respond to various concrete stimuli.

As the newborn continues to develop, so does it's personality, differentiating into something more complex. This would be essentially the way the infant takes in the world, and how this input influences it's upbringing. This would still be very rudimentary, as it would be more or less just the way the experiential input is processed by the developing brain, and how it affects the development of the brain. I would suggest a simple dichotomy, like the infant being either directive or adaptive (rudimentary "J" and "P" respectively). A directive infant would maybe be the kind that cries more often, getting the parents to do things for it, while the adaptive infant might be the quieter kind (but more likely to stick shit into it's mouth).

This is all just hypothetical, off the top of my head, so don't put too much stock into it's detail.

You're right, Freud and Jung already went through this. Look into Freud's model of psychosexual development, if you[anyone] haven't already. As the saying goes "Don't reinvent the wheel". I'm not speaking to you directly, but the matter of applying typology to infants.

 

[RobdoR]

I like to imagine that as the brain forms it settles into a particular temperament. Like rolling dice, there is probably a period of uncertainty where minor environmental factors can affect the outcome. After a while the brain settles down. Since the brain is a dynamic feedback loop, I imagine that there are "strange attractors" that can lock the brain into one temperament while still allowing for plenty of diversity. This seems to explain why there can be strikingly similar temperaments. Then experience will build on that to form a complete personality.

 

[BigApplePi]

I like to imagine that as the brain forms it settles into a particular temperament. Like rolling dice, there is probably a period of uncertainty where minor environmental factors can affect the outcome. After a while the brain settles down. Since the brain is a dynamic feedback loop, I imagine that there are "strange attractors" that can lock the brain into one temperament while still allowing for plenty of diversity. This seems to explain why there can be strikingly similar temperaments. Then experience will build on that to form a complete personality.

Is this on track?

We start out in the womb with a set of genes. These genes are undeveloped. Hormones and other womb influences come along and turn on some genes and keep others off. Then we are born and this continues. Perhaps some initial temperament emerges. We have to watch for this by observation. Then the environment continues to influence and turn on genes as well as develop experiences that grow the brain. Maybe parts of the brain are more disposed to development, maybe not. But environment kicks in early and writes on a relatively blank slate. So we have to observe the early years to check out what's what.

 

[Agent Intellect]

You're right, Freud and Jung already went through this. Look into Freud's model of psychosexual development, if you[anyone] haven't already. As the saying goes "Don't reinvent the wheel". I'm not speaking to you directly, but the matter of applying typology to infants.

I'm not thinking this would work like Freud's psychosexual development (which I don't believe has any basis in reality). I don't think there would be any fixed levels of development. It would be more like personality differentiation, like a cell going from a stem cell to a liver cell, or kidney cell, or bone cell etc. I might call this psychogenesis, similar to morphogenesis. But, instead of hormones and cell signaling driving the differentiation, it would be external stimuli.

The initial setting (the way the world is experienced) would be determined by genetics, and therefore would strongly influence the way the persons personality develops, but ultimately the psychogenesis would be directed by upbringing - genetics determines the shape of the container, but upbringing determines what gets put inside.

Off the top of my head, I might propose this as a model:

Newborns (maybe late term fetus): Core consciousness emerges. The newborn develops a proto-mental model of it's own internal milieu (the state of it's body and homeostasis). The state of it's internal milieu changes due to various external stimuli. Different newborns, depending on genetics, will have different bodily reactions to the same stimuli, which shapes the way the brain develops. The way the body reacts to these stimuli could be called a rudimentary personality, as each newborn reacts in it's own personal way to the same stimuli.

Infants: they begin developing their own personal way of interacting with the world. They no longer simply react in a behavioralist way to stimuli, but have now developed enough of a brain to begin experiencing rudimentary self-object relationship models - they start to become self aware by developing a knowing that there is an external world that is different from their self. Their personality is the way in which they choose to interact with the world in this self-object relationship. The hypothesized way I talked about above was a directive-adaptive dichotomy, where the directive infant would be sort of a proto-extroverted judging function, while adaptive would be a proto-introverted judging function. Essentially a directive personality would be concerned with changing and utilizing it's environment, while an adaptive personality would be concerned with exploring and understanding it's environment.

The first thing to really differentiate, in this case, would be the judging function. A directive infant would differentiate into either Te or Fe, while an adaptive infant would differentiate into either Ti or Fi. Whether they are directive or adaptive would be based on genetics, but whether it became a feeling or thinking function would have more to do with environmental factors.

I would guess that all young children are extroverted sensors (or some early developmental flavor of the function, which I might call Sd for developmental sensing), simply because this is the best way for a child to explore the world. I think there would have to be some genetic factor that determines whether they ultimately turn out to be Se, Si, Ne, or Ni, simply because the way the brain wires itself would have to be quite different for these functions (the papers I've read have always demonstrated that the largest difference in personality type according to fMRI and PET scans is the N-S dichotomy).

So, I might propose that at an early age everyone is Sd dominant (and either directive or adaptive auxiliary), but with something else acting like an inferior perceiving function (sort of "lying dormant" as the instructions for how the brain is wiring itself) that will eventually become the auxiliary function and take the place of this Sd function (Se, Si, Ne, Ni) as they develop. Obviously this happens gradually - nobody just wakes up one day suddenly Ni dominant or something.

Just like with the judging function, different environmental factors will cause the child to become introverted or extroverted in their perceiving function - the genetic factor has more to do with whether they will have a more connective (intuition) perception or concrete (sensing) perception. Environmental factors will determine whether the connective perception will be divergent (Ne) or convergent (Ni); or whether the concrete perception will be external (Se) or internal (Si).

At this point, "normal" function development will proceed (dominant -> auxiliary -> tertiary -> inferior).

 

[BigApplePi]

I don't think there would be any fixed levels of development. It would be more like personality differentiation, like a cell going from a stem cell to a liver cell, or kidney cell, or bone cell etc. I might call this psychogenesis, similar to morphogenesis. But, instead of hormones and cell signaling driving the differentiation, it would be external stimuli.

The initial setting (the way the world is experienced) would be determined by genetics, and therefore would strongly influence the way the persons personality develops, but ultimately the psychogenesis would be directed by upbringing - genetics determines the shape of the container, but upbringing determines what gets put inside.

I think this is correct, but let me suggest some more. Heredity vs. Environment has long been an issue. The way I see it is these terms are no longer so clear cut. This comes into play. What is inherited is DNA, a code. Some of this code gets implemented and some doesn't according to some authorities. What determines what gets implemented? Chemistry. Hormones? Environmental experiences? This makes "genetics" fail to be a well-defined container. Think of a balloon or a sponge as a container and then come up with a better one.

Off the top of my head, I might propose this as a model:

Newborns (maybe late term fetus): Core consciousness emerges. The newborn develops a proto-mental model of it's own internal milieu (the state of it's body and homeostasis). The state of it's internal milieu changes due to various external stimuli. Different newborns, depending on genetics, will have different bodily reactions to the same stimuli, which shapes the way the brain develops. The way the body reacts to these stimuli could be called a rudimentary personality, as each newborn reacts in it's own personal way to the same stimuli.

Infants: they begin developing their own personal way of interacting with the world. They no longer simply react in a behavioralist way to stimuli, but have now developed enough of a brain to begin experiencing rudimentary self-object relationship models - they start to become self aware by developing a knowing that there is an external world that is different from their self. Their personality is the way in which they choose to interact with the world in this self-object relationship. The hypothesized way I talked about above was a directive-adaptive dichotomy, where the directive infant would be sort of a proto-extroverted judging function, while adaptive would be a proto-introverted judging function. Essentially a directive personality would be concerned with changing and utilizing it's environment, while an adaptive personality would be concerned with exploring and understanding it's environment.

Though genetics may cause different reactions to the same stimuli, what about the converse? Different stimuli may affect the container itself. I've heard of studies where behavior actually changes the size of special brain areas. Now with a larger container, the personality can behave differently. (Ask me and I'll supply or look for more details.)

The first thing to really differentiate, in this case, would be the judging function. A directive infant would differentiate into either Te or Fe, while an adaptive infant would differentiate into either Ti or Fi. Whether they are directive or adaptive would be based on genetics, but whether it became a feeling or thinking function would have more to do with environmental factors.

This is really a good conjecture. Picture an initially directive infant being suppressed. Picture an adaptive infant subject to stimulus and response ... Pavlov style! What data has been observed on this? What controlled experiment has been denied because we can't implement the controls?

AI when you spoke of psychogenesis and morphogenesis, that reminded me of another tool for understanding: motion or change. Change need not be abrupt as with birth --> life outside the womb appears to be. We have the word "heredity" and the word "environment" but no word for in between! Environment can change the container.

 

[SkyWalker]

I think it runs much deeper than what grows in the womb.

Even bacteria, single cells, amoeba, etc have "personality". Check colonies of amoeba, one is overhelpful, another is "narcissitic", etc.

I think it's impossible for any system (be it biological or artificial) to manifest in this reality of opposites without "choosing" a perspective.

 

[Fukyo]

the cognitive function hierarchy cannot be broken or changed.

What about people functioning relatively normally with only one brain hemisphere?

The authors, Feinstein et al from Iowa City, have studied the patient, "Roger", for 14 years. Roger was born in 1952, and lived a fairly uneventful life until he contracted herpes simplex encephalitis (HSE) at the age of 28.

Spoiler

The amount of destroyed neural tissue is extensive and includes bilateral damage to core limbic and paralimbic regions, including the hippocampus, amygdala, parahippocampal gyrus, temporal poles, orbitofrontal cortex, basal forebrain, anterior cingulate cortex, and insular cortex. The right hemisphere is more extensively affected than the left, although the lesions are largely bilateral.

This is, obviously, a disabling deficit: Roger cannot lead a normal life. But in other areas of mental functioning, he is quite normal. His IQ is above average; his speech and language abilities are excellent; his vision and hearing are normal, although he has no sense of taste or smell. His short term (working) memory, attention, and reasoning abilities are unimpaired. His motor abilities are fine - he is reportedly an excellent bowler - and he is able to improve motor skills through practice. And his recall of things which happened before the infection is largely preserved, although the few years just before the infection are partially lost.

Roger is paradoxically happier now than he was before his brain damage. ... His premorbid disposition of being somewhat reserved and introverted has shifted to being outgoing and extroverted...

A 10-year-old girl from Germany has had quite a normal life despite the fact that she was born with only half her brain.

Spoiler

Even more surprising, she has almost perfect vision in one of her eyes.

The girl's brain rewired itself — likely in the womb — so that it's able to process information from both the right and left fields of vision even though she is missing the right brain hemisphere, which failed to develop while she was in the womb.

She has had an almost normal developmental and medical history, attending regular school and taking part in activities such as roller-skating.

"Despite lacking one hemisphere, the girl has normal psychological function and is perfectly capable of living a normal and fulfilling life. She is witty, charming and intelligent," said Muckli.

What happens to their cognitive configuration, where do they fall in the Adaptive - Directive dichotomy? What about typing them via physiological cue reading?

 

[BigApplePi]

What about people functioning relatively normally with only one brain hemisphere?

The authors, Feinstein et al from Iowa City, have studied the patient, "Roger", for 14 years. Roger was born in 1952, and lived a fairly uneventful life until he contracted herpes simplex encephalitis (HSE) at the age of 28.

Spoiler

The amount of destroyed neural tissue is extensive and includes bilateral damage to core limbic and paralimbic regions, including the hippocampus, amygdala, parahippocampal gyrus, temporal poles, orbitofrontal cortex, basal forebrain, anterior cingulate cortex, and insular cortex. The right hemisphere is more extensively affected than the left, although the lesions are largely bilateral.

This is, obviously, a disabling deficit: Roger cannot lead a normal life. But in other areas of mental functioning, he is quite normal. His IQ is above average; his speech and language abilities are excellent; his vision and hearing are normal, although he has no sense of taste or smell. His short term (working) memory, attention, and reasoning abilities are unimpaired. His motor abilities are fine - he is reportedly an excellent bowler - and he is able to improve motor skills through practice. And his recall of things which happened before the infection is largely preserved, although the few years just before the infection are partially lost.

Roger is paradoxically happier now than he was before his brain damage. ... His premorbid disposition of being somewhat reserved and introverted has shifted to being outgoing and extroverted...

A 10-year-old girl from Germany has had quite a normal life despite the fact that she was born with only half her brain.

Spoiler

Even more surprising, she has almost perfect vision in one of her eyes.

The girl's brain rewired itself — likely in the womb — so that it's able to process information from both the right and left fields of vision even though she is missing the right brain hemisphere, which failed to develop while she was in the womb.

She has had an almost normal developmental and medical history, attending regular school and taking part in activities such as roller-skating.

"Despite lacking one hemisphere, the girl has normal psychological function and is perfectly capable of living a normal and fulfilling life. She is witty, charming and intelligent," said Muckli.

What happens to their cognitive configuration, where do they fall in the Adaptive - Directive dichotomy? What about typing them via physiological cue reading?

Half a brain is better than none one.

 

[SkyWalker]

hahaha.... Fu*k Yo* you never told us that you have half a brain? Respect for you! I don't even mind your answer now! Respect!

 

[Wayne]

How much has our personality to do with genes and environment?

Let's say we would have been adopted in an early age and raised in a totally different family. Would we possible become ESFJ:s instead?

I have two brothers. My oldest brother are INTJ and my youngest brother INTP. I am INTP also. Our father is INTJ and our mother probably is ISFJ.

Is it a coincidence that the oldest of us are J while the younger brothers are P or could it be because of he being oldest and had to take more responsability to get things done?

And are our similarities caused of genes, environemt or is it just a coincidence that we are three INT:s in the same family?

What do you think?

How much has our personality to do with genes and environment?

 

[snafupants]

Re: How much has our personality to do with genes and environment?

Exactly eight three percent of personality is attributable to genes.

 

[Fukyo]

I merged the threads, also yesterday I posted a link in the Random Thread II that could be of interest to you.

 

[Wayne]

I'm not thinking this would work like Freud's psychosexual development (which I don't believe has any basis in reality). I don't think there would be any fixed levels of development. It would be more like personality differentiation, like a cell going from a stem cell to a liver cell, or kidney cell, or bone cell etc. I might call this psychogenesis, similar to morphogenesis. But, instead of hormones and cell signaling driving the differentiation, it would be external stimuli.

The initial setting (the way the world is experienced) would be determined by genetics, and therefore would strongly influence the way the persons personality develops, but ultimately the psychogenesis would be directed by upbringing - genetics determines the shape of the container, but upbringing determines what gets put inside.

Off the top of my head, I might propose this as a model:

Newborns (maybe late term fetus): Core consciousness emerges. The newborn develops a proto-mental model of it's own internal milieu (the state of it's body and homeostasis). The state of it's internal milieu changes due to various external stimuli. Different newborns, depending on genetics, will have different bodily reactions to the same stimuli, which shapes the way the brain develops. The way the body reacts to these stimuli could be called a rudimentary personality, as each newborn reacts in it's own personal way to the same stimuli.

Infants: they begin developing their own personal way of interacting with the world. They no longer simply react in a behavioralist way to stimuli, but have now developed enough of a brain to begin experiencing rudimentary self-object relationship models - they start to become self aware by developing a knowing that there is an external world that is different from their self. Their personality is the way in which they choose to interact with the world in this self-object relationship. The hypothesized way I talked about above was a directive-adaptive dichotomy, where the directive infant would be sort of a proto-extroverted judging function, while adaptive would be a proto-introverted judging function. Essentially a directive personality would be concerned with changing and utilizing it's environment, while an adaptive personality would be concerned with exploring and understanding it's environment.

The first thing to really differentiate, in this case, would be the judging function. A directive infant would differentiate into either Te or Fe, while an adaptive infant would differentiate into either Ti or Fi. Whether they are directive or adaptive would be based on genetics, but whether it became a feeling or thinking function would have more to do with environmental factors.

I would guess that all young children are extroverted sensors (or some early developmental flavor of the function, which I might call Sd for developmental sensing), simply because this is the best way for a child to explore the world. I think there would have to be some genetic factor that determines whether they ultimately turn out to be Se, Si, Ne, or Ni, simply because the way the brain wires itself would have to be quite different for these functions (the papers I've read have always demonstrated that the largest difference in personality type according to fMRI and PET scans is the N-S dichotomy).

So, I might propose that at an early age everyone is Sd dominant (and either directive or adaptive auxiliary), but with something else acting like an inferior perceiving function (sort of "lying dormant" as the instructions for how the brain is wiring itself) that will eventually become the auxiliary function and take the place of this Sd function (Se, Si, Ne, Ni) as they develop. Obviously this happens gradually - nobody just wakes up one day suddenly Ni dominant or something.

Just like with the judging function, different environmental factors will cause the child to become introverted or extroverted in their perceiving function - the genetic factor has more to do with whether they will have a more connective (intuition) perception or concrete (sensing) perception. Environmental factors will determine whether the connective perception will be divergent (Ne) or convergent (Ni); or whether the concrete perception will be external (Se) or internal (Si).

At this point, "normal" function development will proceed (dominant -> auxiliary -> tertiary -> inferior).

Really intresting.

Thank you for posting.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

Re: How much has our personality to do with genes and environment?

Genetics is the glass, environment is the water. Produces all kinds of results.

Half full, half empty, overflowing, grape kool aid mix added, etc.