IELTS Essay: Genetics or Environment?

 IELTS Essay: 
Genetics or Environment?

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Writing task 2


>People's character is influenced by environment rather than genetics.  Do you agree or disagree?


>Research indicates that the characteristics we were born with have more influence on our personality and development than the experience we had in life.  To what extent do you agree or disagree?



Essay Sample

Admitting that heredity may be behind a person's characteristics in some respects, environment is by far more decisive in developing a person's overall character.  It makes educational sense that nurture matters more than nature simply because genetics, although having its share of influence to some extent, should not be considered as fate. Otherwise, should a person's character be entirely predictable even before birth, the environmental factors like personal experiences would mean little to life.

As a point of departure for discussion, there is no denying that genes play a role in shaping a person's behavior (and disease).  Researches show some aspects of character are inherited, to be sure.  The discovery of DNA has further proved this point.  Recent experiments, showing that identical twins raised apart share an uncanny number of behavioral traits, back that up.  Interestingly enough, twins think alike and prefer the same colors and smells.  Nevertheless, so far attempts to tag a particular behavior to a particular gene have become problematic.  It indicates that many genes in many generations are at work like many notes on the piano displaying intricate compositions.  It seems to  imply that genetics as natural influence on character tend to defy conclusive explanations.

On the other hand, the influence of environment or nurture is more obvious and convincing. To illustrate, people are fashioned by education much as plants by cultivation.  For instance, parents choose, if possible, to make their homes in morally healthy neighborhood in the hope that their children would not be under undesirable influence.  In general, experience in life is closely linked to families, friends, classmates, co-workers, inmates, as well as to the media outlets like television, radio, the internet.  Indeed, the influence of nurturing is so overwhelming that few would doubt that criminal conducts are often the result of bad parenting or bad nurturing. Furthermore, psychologists are inclined to believe that a serial killer is made, not born.

All this argument leads to the conclusion that the environment contributes more to deciding people's character while how much genetic characteristics have such influence requires further studies. It can be seen that experiences obtained from environment are so powerful and yet so unpredictable that they can either boost or over-ride other influences like genetics.  In any case, nobody should ever imagine the cruel idea of putting a new-born kid to death for only unfortunately being an offspring of a convicted criminal worthy of capital punishment.