The Dissenter #50 Nancy Segal: Accidental Brothers, Twin Studies, Nature and Nurture, Epigenetics & More
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Dr. Nancy Segal is Professor of Developmental Psychology and Director of the Twin Studies Center, at California State University, Fullerton. She’s been the recipient of many awards and distinctions. She served as Assistant Director of the Minnesota Center for Twin and Adoption Research, in the Department of Psychology at the University of Minnesota, from 1985 to 1991. She’s also the author of many books, including Entwined Lives, Indivisible by Two, Someone Else's Twin, Born Together-Reared Apart, and, the latest one, Accidental Brothers: The Story of Twins Exchanged at Birth and the Power of Nature and Nurture.
The central theme of this episode is Dr. Segal’s latest book, Accidental Brothers. We start the conversation with some personal questions, about what it was for Dr. Segal to live as and have a relationship with her fraternal twin, and also what she deemed to be the most interesting findings coming from the MISTRA (Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart). Subsequent topics include: studies with identical, fraternal and virtual twins, and triplets, and what they teach us about human nature; how people express themselves more fully as they get independent from their family; the nature vs nurture dichotomy, and also nurture via nature and nature via nurture approaches; the role of chance in people’s lives; epigenetics and the prenatal environment; how behavioral genetics might inform parenting practices; and related subjects.
Time Links:
01:08 Growing up as a fraternal twin
04:12 Findings from the MISTRA
08:50 The Colombian virtual twins
12:33 When twins reunite
14:37 What happens when people get independent from their family
17:11 Passive gene-environment correlations
18:46 Nature vs nurture
21:03 Does genetics set upper limits to our potential?
23:33 Have twins studies a WEIRD effect?
25:22 The role of chance in children’s development
27:21 Twin studies and parental uncertainty
29:29 Studies with triplets
30:55 Epigenetics
33:38 Prenatal environment
34:36 Diversity in human societies
40:11 Nurture via nature
41:07 Behavioral genetics and parenting practices
46:23 Follow Dr. Segal’s work
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Follow Dr. Segal’s work:
Faculty page: http://psych.fullerton.edu/nsegal/
Personal website: http://drnancysegaltwins.org/
Twitter handle: @nlsegal
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