[tips] Re: student question about abuse

[Dr. Tasha Howe]

Judith Rich Harris would argue that it's not ok to abuse your kids because it makes home life unpleasant at the current time, but that abuse would have no lasting impact on adult personality or functioning. Genes and peers would "matter more." I would refer you to some early point-counterpoints in the literature that I think better hash out the issue than Rich's often myopic focus on self-report and behavior-genetic data. See Sandra Scarr (talking about any "good enough" environment leading to good outcomes) and Diana Baumrind arguing that point, in Child Development, a few years back.

I'm not aware of any behavior genetics studies on the generational transmission of abuse, but these studies have their own set of flaws, causality cannot be determined from them (e.g., shared environment is not directly measured but inferred), and their results almost always boil down to about 50% of anything being genes and 50% of anything being environment. I'm not sure why this would matter?

We won't be able to change people's genes but we can prevent them from harming their children. What we do know is that intervention and prevention programs work, regardless of "bad" or "good" genes or "bad" parenting combined with those genes. As you all know, causality is virtually impossible to illuminate in quasi experimental designs...

At 09:59 AM 9/6/2006, you wrote:

On Wed, 6 Sep 2006, Dr. Tasha Howe went:

The data show that about 1/3 of people who are abused or neglected
by their parents end up abusing or neglecting their own children.

Is there evidence, e.g. from studies of twins reared apart, that their
earlier victimization at home is a major _cause_ of their adult
behavior?  My impression, from each of Judith Rich Harris's books, is
that there isn't much evidence of that.

--David Epstein
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

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==========================
Tasha R. Howe, Ph.D
Associate Professor of Psychology
Humboldt State University
1 Harpst Street
Arcata, CA  95521
Phone: (707) 826-3759
FAX: (707) 826-4993
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Webpage: http://www.humboldt.edu/~psych/fs/howe/howe.htm

"The time to be happy is now.  The place to be happy is here.  The way to be happy is to make others so."
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