The Nature of Nurture: Rethinking Why and How Childhood Adversity Shapes Development

From a leading expert on child development, a radical evolutionary perspective on how childhood experiences shape later life.

Children who grow up in troubled circumstances—experiencing deprivation or instability, living in a dangerous neighborhood or an abusive family—are more prone to aggression, recklessness, and sexual promiscuity later in life. To most of us, the lesson is clear: adverse childhood conditions make human development go awry.

In The Nature of Nurture, renowned developmental psychologist Jay Belsky challenges this interpretation and offers an exciting alternative based on Darwinian theory. There is no reason to assume, he points out, that the psychology of “well—behaved” people is normal while that of “antisocial” adults is aberrant. Instead, the supposedly dysfunctional behaviors correlated with childhood adversity could well be ingenious adaptations to harsh environments. If you are surrounded by danger and uncertainty, then being quick to lash out at potential threats and having lots of offspring at an early age are good ways to maximize your reproductive chances. From an evolutionary perspective, having just a few children and lavishing care on each works well in a stable world, but not in a perilous one.

Belsky exposes the romanticism underlying our idealized notions that “natural” equals “good” and that nature intends to maximize human happiness and well—being. When instead we take seriously the fact that humans, too, have been shaped by evolutionary pressures, we can better understand why, how, and for whom childhood experience shapes later life.