Steven Pinker Responds At Length
On Sunday, the New York Times published my review of a new book by Paul Tough, “How Children Succeed.” The Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker tweeted the review, criticizing it for not mentioning genes. I responded with this blog post, after which Professor Pinker sent me the email below. With his permission I’ve reproduced it in its entirety. Readers, I’d love to hear your thoughts; please leave comments in the box at the bottom of the page.—Annie
Dear Annie (if I may),
A colleague called my attention to your blog posting replying to my tweet that had commented on your New York Times review of the book by Paul Tough. You note, as I had suspected, that you had “never even thought about genetic influences” when writing the review. This kind of inattention to a major shaper (perhaps the major shaper) of character in a book about the shaping of character was, of course, exactly why I wrote The Blank Slate.
You ask a reasonable question, “I’m left to wonder how a discussion of genes would have factored into my review.” Here are some of the ways:
1. “Psychologists and neuroscientists have learned a lot in the past few decades about where these skills come from and how they are developed,” Tough writes, and what they’ve discovered can be summed up in a sentence: Character is created by encountering and overcoming failure.
This statement is false. What psychologists and neuroscientists have discovered over the past few decades about the shaping of self-control and other character traits either cannot be summed up in one sentence, or if it is, that sentence would have to include mention of three robust discoveries: a substantial amount of variation in character is caused by variation in genes; the remaining variation is substantial; and the remaining variation is not, for the most part, attributable to differences in parenting or other familial factors. This is explained in detail in the chapter on “Children” in The Blank Slate.
2. “Many poor children don’t develop the resilience Kewauna has in such abundance, and the reason, Tough says, can be traced back to their troubled home lives: “The part of the brain most affected by early stress is the prefrontal cortex, which is critical in self-regulatory activities of all kinds, both emotional and cognitive. As a result, children who grow up in stressful environments generally find it harder to concentrate, harder to sit still, harder to rebound from disappointments and harder to follow directions.”
This may be true, but it may very well be false. The reason that Kewauna had such foresight and self-control may have nothing to do with her not having grown up in a stressful environment. For all we know she may have inherited a suite of genes that gave her high levels of self-control.
3. “Children can be buffered from surrounding stresses by attentive, responsive parenting, but the adults in these children’s lives are often too burdened by their own problems to offer such care.”
This claim is based on the finding that children with responsive parents tend to be more resilient. The conclusion is that responsive parenting causes resilience in children. But that is an unsound inference, which depends on the dogma of the Blank Slate. It’s also possible that responsible parents pass on genes for responsibility to their offspring. Only a genetically sensitive research design – one that looks at twins or adoptees, seeing, for example, whether adopted children’s resilience is better correlated with their birth parents or their adoptive parents, could establish the causal claims that Tough advances and that you endorse.
4. “Rich kids, Tough adds, may also lack a nurturing connection to their mothers and fathers — not so much in their early years as when they enter adolescence and the push for achievement intensifies. He explores the research of Suniya Luthar, a psychology professor at Teachers College, Columbia University. Luthar “found that parenting mattered at both socioeconomic extremes. For both rich and poor teenagers, certain family characteristics predicted children’s maladjustment, including low levels of maternal attachment, high levels of parental criticism and minimal after-school adult supervision. Among the affluent children, Luthar found, the main cause of distress was ‘excessive achievement pressures and isolation from parents — both physical and emotional.’ ”
This, too, could be entirely false, since it is not based on genetically sensitive research designs.
5. “Tough, a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine, portrays a country of very privileged children and very poor ones, both deprived of the emotional and intellectual experiences that make for sturdy character. …
Fewer and fewer young people are getting the character-building combination of support and autonomy that Tough was fortunate enough to receive.”
Again, the conclusions that parents shape character may be entirely unwarranted. In the absence of genetically sensitive research designs, observed differences in character may be caused by genes, random chance in development, or environmental differences that are not parental or familial, such as peers, teachers, and culture.
These are some of the ways in which acknowledgment of the existence of genes could have changed the review. Note that the possibility of genetic influences does not mean that that all the influences are genetic, nor that self-control and foresight cannot be improved by training (see my review of the recent book on willpower by Roy Baumeister and John Tierney. But it does mean that parents cannot be automatically credited or blamed for their children’s character, as your review seems to do.
Note as well that it is irrelevant that “We have no way of knowing (not yet, anyway) what combination of genes individual children possess that will allow them to take advantage, or not, of the interventions described in Tough’s book.” We may not know that the exact combination of genes, but we do know that genes, in aggregate, matter.
I hope that you do not interpret this note as adversarial or critical; it is my response to the challenge in your blog posting. The failure to think about genes that you confessed to in that posting is symptomatic of a much larger blind spot in intellectual life which, as I mentioned, was the impetus to my writing The Blank Slate. I also recommend the two brilliant books by Judith Rich Harris, The Nurture Assumption and No Two Alike; the former was a major inspiration for the “Children” chapter in The Blank Slate.
Sincerely,
Steve Pinker
Hi,
I wonder how much time Stephen Pinker has spent in the hard core inner city. I taught in the West Englewood area of the the south side of Chicago for seven years, and I can tell you that children retaining their resiliency in the face of the deadening atmosphere that exists all around them is entirely about strength of character, as both you and Paul Tough allude to.
Pinker is not saying that kids growing up on the South Side aren’t resilient. His argument is about how that resiliency is, or is not, created. Where does it come from? Why do some South Side kids have it and others do not? Pinker would say it is not sound science to blame or credit the parents, since part of the answer is inherited through one’s genes. We just don’t know which “exact combination of genes” is responsible.
What Pinker is saying, is that strength of character could be the result of their upbringing, or their genes, or a combination of the two. To suggest that genes do not enter into the picture is to make an error.
You seem to miss entirely his repeated theme regarding the the development of a good, scientific, model to test your theory and hypotheses. By not including a control for genetic possibilities you leave a gaping hole in you experiment in this case you could drive a mack truck through. We’re not born a blank slate with alterations exclusively due to external factors. It’s nature and nurture, half missing from the study/experiment. You then err by invoking your subjective, unmeasurable, individual experience, and compounding it further by generalizing from n=1. Not possible. Oh, anecdotal information as well which gains you no points either.
For someone chastising another for lack of scientific methodology, you seem to know precious little about the biological sciences. Genes don’t control behaviour, genes don’t code for behaviour, genes only code for proteins.
Seems I may have been wrong to assume that the “G-word” Pinker was referring to was the “the G-factor” rather than “genes”; although he didn’t actually say one way or the other. On the other hand, his response could be seen as, at least in part, an argument for the importance of the G-factor
I have read all the books Pinker recommends and they are crucial to any educated understanding of what makes us who we are. Also noteworthy is “Entwined Lives” by Nancy Segal, which explains the results of extensive twin and adoption studies. Adopted children correlate strongly in terms of personality with the biological parents they have never met. Identical twins separated at birth are far more similar than any siblings raised in the same home. Articles such as this one are scientifically ignorant to a shocking degree. We have known for many decades that character is in large part genetic. To ignore the extensive research because one fears it is somehow politically incorrect is as foolish as discounting the human effect on climate change. Genes determine not only our eye and hair color, they create the architecture of our brains. That architecture is responsible for a huge amount of our personality. Every science reporter should be forced to read at least The Blank Slate and The Nurture Assumption before writing articles like this.
Difficult to read but fascinating. I’m very curious as to how Steven Pinker would respond to the work of fellow Harvard researcher Martin Teicher. I worked in therapeutic foster care during graduate school and was a huge fan of Dr. Teicher’s work, which seems to outline a negative environmental role (i.e., he didn’t address parents shaping character but outlined the ways suboptimal environments can harm it.)
Pinker changed my view of nature/nuture. The Blank slate took me 3 months to read, but it was extremely worthwhile. Easily one of the most well written, well researched books I’ve ever read. Props.
Pinker is repectfully bringing truth and clear thinking to the matter, which he performs well. Hope his intent and enlightenment is well recieved.
Fearful of sounding simple; I enjoyed the response from Pinker reminds us, after all it is not nature OR nurture, it’s nature vs. nurture. Thoughtful reaction requires us to consider the influence of both. Thank you, less, we jump to conclusions.
I think that what Pinker outlines here is spot on. I love his ability to break down complex, easily misunderstood concepts into chunks that are clear, concise and accurate. The Blank Slate was definitely called for. Denial of how genes influence our development (in the interest of avoiding sounding eugenic) has thrown loads of parenting and child development research off the scent of what’s really going on. I see it all the time in the field of counseling and psychology.
Big Kudos to Annie for posting Pinker’s response. And I think he’s genuine in saying that he in no way means to be adversarial or critical. He seems to be a genuine cat across the board.
Yet another “straw man” attack from Pinker. His own theories consistently fail scientific scrutiny, yet this has no bearing on his reputation. Lewontin seems to be right.
Nathan, please explain how this is a strawman or that his own theories (which aren’t his) fail scientific scrutiny.
A strawman is to misrepresent what somebody else is saying and attack that misrepresentation. Pinker seems to have addressed exactly what Tough’s argument is, that parenting environment causes the traits cited (such as resilience), and appears to be correct that it fails to control for genes. (Parents provide both parenting environment and genes.) Where is the strawman?
As far as failing scientific scrutiny, The Blank Slate is one of the most well referenced scientific books I’ve ever read, perhaps surpassed by The Nurture Assumption (Judith Rich Harris) that he references. I’m constantly looking for counter-evidence but have not found any. Tough’s references seem to be the ones to fail scientific scrutiny because they don’t control for genetic inheritance and assume correlation = causation.
Again, please provide your arguments and/or references rather than blind assertion and insult.
The Blank Slate is a strawman since very few scientists have ever held this view. There is no need to control for genes since we know genes don’t cause behaviour, they don’t control behaviour, they don’t even help shape behaviour, genes only code for proteins.
There are some things we can control and some things we can not. We should do what we can to help children reach their full potentials irregardless of one’s genetic constraints/limitations.
…in other words, pointing out that genetics may play a role in who we ‘are’ is not helpful for teaching anyone how to become well adjusted, law abiding, productive adult.
Renee, that’s not entirely true. Knowing what you can and can’t control is always helpful. It is very helpful in putting effort where it can have an effect. Many parents put a lot of effort and worry into controlling every detail of their child’s upbringing which very likely will have little to no effect on how they turn out, or worse will deprive them of experiences that could help.
For example, if genes contribute about half of the variation of adult behaviors and the other half is dependent on surrounding culture, and almost zero has to do with home life, then a parent is better off spending time addressing the local culture than fine-tuning parenting techniques at home.
Knowing how it works is very important to getting it right.
Thank you! the research I have read indicates the home does have a significant impact on children’s success (my child and I are currently participating in a study being conducted by a local university regarding school motivation and parental influences. Also i am involved in a volunteer mentoring program at the public schools. Hopefully, I am not wasting anyones time!
The mentoring program was started because children need at least three adults in their lives that can offer them non-judgmental, nurturing support… Whether or not those people are parents may not matter (but probably in most cases, parents do play that essential role and tend to be a child’s strongest advocate)
sorry for posting way too much… but I stumbled across a very interesting article by Steven Pinker. In the article, he states:
“I do acknowledge an influence from my parents; not in making me the person I am but in my view of what’s important in my life, what I think about and cherish.”
in other words, he admits that his parents deeply influenced his values… though, oddly, the article begins with a disclaimer that appears to dismiss his own personal feelings.
The article begins with “I think parents are overrated as shapers of values.”
source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/jan/24/my-family-values-steven-pinker
My own work is a popularizing of the genetic differences found between liberals and conservatives in America. Excellent work based on twin studies (multiple studies) show our ideology to be over 50% inherited, with an additional 15-25% influence from our early upbringing. As with the subject matter here, certain shibboleths are threatened when confronting a vast influence from genetics, even when coupled with the influence of the people that handed us the genetics. However, as in my case, there are many powerful inferences for action that can arise from sticking with the power of genetics to explain either personality or resultant behavior.
Part of what the professor is implicitly inferring is the necessity to break down and rebuild our notion of what constitutes morality, i.e., the often-assumed agency-driven view of how we determine our right and wrong, and our communal responses to morality failures. We want to tiptoe our way around mentioning that good and bad behaviors (and maybe more importantly, correlates to good and bad behaviors) have a significant genetic component. Our current assumptions around morality (which are inextribably tied in with my field of ideology) are based on a view of being handed stone plates of commandments, or somesuch. This magical realism approach to morality leads us to assume that individuals magically know what constitutes good morals, and then purely determine their ‘salvation’, or their goodness, through free agency based on the strength of their character. Our actual moral impetuses are much better described as a rich combination of genetic and cultural impulses, with (hopefully) a goodly layer of free will involved. Whatever free will means.
I’m not cynical. On the contrary, I’m a realist and practical. I am, after all, about to address the 4 inherited personality characteristics that explain most of our ideological conflicts in America, at least at the individual level. The only people we should offend when we relegate significant blame for character and moral-related behaviors to genetics are magical realists. Yet I find that most of us, left and right (for nearly opposite reasons), carry around a very strong implicit assumption that the blank slate is king. On the contrary! I predict the biggest difference between the next century and this one will be seen through the application of genetic information in our struggle for peace and prosperity in the world. We’re already ignoring vast amounts of genetics-related science in the interests of either the right, the left, or their collusion, and could make great strides just running with what we already know.
“What fine teeth you have.”