Nature & Nurture Theories

 Nature:-
When IQ tests were administered to inmates of prisons and juvenile training schools early in the twentieth century, a large proportion of the inmates scored low on the tests. Henry Goddard found in 1920 that many institutionalized persons were “feebleminded” and concluded that at least half of all juvenile delinquents were mental defectives.201 In 1926, William Healy and Augusta Bronner tested a group of delinquents in Chicago and Boston and found that 37 percent were subnormal in intelligence.202 They concluded that delinquents were 5 to 10 times more likely to be mentally defi cient than nondelinquent boys. These and other early studies were embraced as proof that a correlation existed between innate low intelligence and deviant behavior. IQ tests were believed to measure genetic makeup, and many psychologists accepted the predisposition of substandard individuals toward delinquency. This view is referred to as the nature theory of intelligence.

Nurture:-
Nurture theory argues that intelligence is not inherited and that low-IQ parents do not necessarily produce low-IQ children. This view holds that intelligence must be viewed as partly biological and primarily sociological. Nurture theorists discredit the notion that people commit crimes because they have low IQs. Instead, they postulate that environmental stimulation from parents, schools, peer groups, and others create a child’s IQ level, and that low IQs result from an environment that also encourages delinquent behavior.204 For example, if educational environments could be improved, the result might be both an elevation in IQ scores and a decrease in delinquency.