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A top behavioral geneticist argues DNA inherited from our parents at conception can predict our psychological strengths and weaknesses. This “modern classic” on genetics and nature vs. nurture is “one of the most direct and unapologetic takes on the topic ever written” (Boston Review). In Blueprint, behavioral geneticist Robert Plomin describes how the DNA revolution has made DNA personal by giving us the power to predict our psychological strengths and weaknesses from birth. A century of genetic research shows that DNA differences inherited from our parents are the consistent lifelong sources of our psychological individuality—the blueprint that makes us who we are. Plomin reports that genetics explains more about the psychological differences among people than all other factors combined. Nature, not nurture, is what makes us who we are. Plomin explores the implications of these findings, drawing some provocative conclusions—among them that parenting styles don't really affect children's outcomes once genetics is taken into effect. This book offers readers a unique insider’s view of the exciting synergies that came from combining genetics and psychology. Read more
Publisher : The MIT Press
Publication date : July 2, 2019
Edition : Illustrated
Language : English
Print length : 292 pages
ISBN-10 : 0262537982
ISBN-13 : 88
Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
Dimensions : 5.37 x 0.77 x 8 inches
Best Sellers Rank: #241,329 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #24 in Developmental Biology (Books) #29 in Biochemistry (Books) #47 in Genetics (Books)
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Top Amazon Reviews
Format: Hardcover
The ageless argument on whether our behavior and intelligence is mostly shaped by environment or by heredity, often referred to as “Nature vs. Nurture”, may finally have an answer: “The Nature of Nurture”. Authored by perhaps the world’s leading behavioral geneticist, Dr. Robert Plomin, “Blueprint” represents the culmination of his 45 years of research into this very subject. To a layperson, the obvious question that comes to mind is how is it even possible to disentangle which behavioral traits are due to nature or nurture? There happens to be two very simple answers to this question: large longitudinal twin and adoption studies combined with the ongoing decoding of the human genome. With Blueprint, Plomin is leveraging the late stage of his distinguished career to publish the culmination of his life’s work on this controversial subject. He’s certainly cognizant of the ideological resistance in the social sciences to any form of genetic explanations, as the prevailing orthodoxy assumes that only environment, and particularly parenting, are causal in largely shaping who we are and our life outcomes. The Nature of Nurture Blueprint’s main thesis is what Plomin calls “the nature of nurture” which posits that our genes are nudging us to respond to, interact with, and even shape our environments to fit our individual genetic dispositions. Plomin states ‘Psychological environments are not “out there” imposed on us passively. They are “in here”, experienced by us as we actively perceive, interpret, select, modify, and even create environments correlated with our genetic propensities.” A simple example Plomin gives is that it’s widely assumed that children who are read to by their parents do better in reading in school and that this is a causal relationship. This is not the case, the relationship is actually correlational in that parents who enjoy reading and who appreciate the value of reading are more likely to be intelligent and want to read to their children too [who share 50% of the parent’s DNA] and that the children inherit some of these traits that make them more interested in and amenable to being read to. The parents may also be picking up on cues exhibited by the child to be read to or who enjoy the stimulation of being read to, while not reading to the child who is restless and would rather engage in rough and tumble play, or play with objects rather than being read to. The is the nature of nurture – subtle genetic cues from the child engage the environmental experience given to the child by the parent and vice versa. Blueprint is divided into two main parts: Part One: Why DNA Matters Chapters 1. Disentangling nature and nurture 2. How do we know that DNA makes us who we are? 3. The nature of nurture 4. DNA matters more as time goes by 5. Abnormal is normal 6. Generalist genes 7. Why children in the same family are so different 8. The DNA blueprint 9. Equal opportunity and meritocracy Part Two: The DNA Revolution Chapters 1. DNA: The basics 2. Gene-hunting 3. The DNA fortune teller 4. Predicting who we are 5. Our future is DNA In the first part of the book, Plomin walks the reader through his early research in behavioral genetics with the Colorado Adoption Project in the 1970s and how these early adoption and twin studies were designed. He explains the fundamentals on how the complex influences of heritability and of the environment can be disentangled and how they are controlled for in studies. And these are not just a few small, single-study samples of twins or adoptions – they encompass tens of thousands of individuals. For example: • Colorado Adoption Project • Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart • Swedish Adoption/Twin Study of Aging • Louisville Twin Study Most significant of all is the ongoing study of 13,000 twins born in the UK in the mid-1990s, who Plomin has been tracking and studying longitudinally for over 20 years, including collecting over 55 million items of data from the twins, their parents, and their teachers during this time. In the second part of the book, Plomin walks the reader through the fundamentals of genetics and explains the terminologies of the science, and how genes are passed on from parent to child. He also explains how genes are identified and studied and how they are now thought to influence our behaviors. His objective here to make the reader literate in genetics as the DNA revolution that’s currently underway will surely advance and have a profound impact on how we understand ourselves. Some key takeaways for this reviewer are: • The nature of nurture • Inherited DNA differences are the major systematic force in making us who we are • Environment matters, but it’s effects are not systematic in nature, rather environment is a collection of random experiences and interactions • Longitudinal twin and adoption studies supply a mountain of evidence and are invaluable to disentangling the influence of genes from the environment • Parenting matters, but not near as much as commonly believed • Educational achievement is more strongly predicted by genes than by environment or SES • The DNA revolution is now identifying the specific bits of genes which correlate to behaviors and with cognitive functions/educational achievement • Very large numbers of genes each contribute a small influence on a given trait (polygenic), rather than a few genes exerting a strong influence as was first thought If there are any shortcomings with Blueprint, it’s that Plomin is careful not to infer extending his findings to group-level differences, such as between males and females or between ethnic groups. Valuable insights can be gained from such a logical extension in terms of better understanding group academic achievement differences, differences in gender behaviors, or group differences in developing criminal or anti-social behaviors with the objective being to identify and mitigate specific causal factors at the genetic level. Plomin has stated that this area is the “3rd Rail” in his field, suggesting that he’s well-aware of the career risks for researching these topics in this day and age of leftist “cancel culture” at universities and in the media - even if the science is on his side. The data presented in Blueprint is about as robust, comprehensive, and predictive that there is in all of the social sciences and Plomin’s findings are incrementally becoming more difficult to refute with the ongoing decoding of the genome. There’s indeed a DNA revolution underway that’s sweeping away old assumptions, dogmas, and ideologies about human nature, and the fight to stem this rising tide of scientific evidence will be fierce, even from within the academy, but the truth will ultimately prevail if history is any lesson. With Blueprint, Plomin is preparing us for this eventuality. So why should you read this book? Now is an exciting age when the scientific revolution of DNA and the decoding of the human genome is advancing at an exponential rate. It’s fundamentally changing our understandings of how DNA makes us who we are and it’s speeding towards head-on collision with old ideological dogmas. But how many of us really understand what the science of DNA is saying about what makes us who we are? How often is our news media sharing this information and objectively explaining what these new findings mean? What Plomin’s work is discovering about the nature of human behavior and genetics is analogous to what Pasteur’s work on germ theory did for understanding the microbial basis of disease transmission. When science can discover the unseen mechanics of nature, gone are the use of nebulous post hoc explanations and one’s ideologies to make sense of the observations. We all would prefer to believe that our behavior and intelligence is mostly shaped by our parenting and by our social and educational environments, because this infers that we can ideally gain control and regulate these factors top-down to produce a more equitable, prosperous, and safer society - but the evidence for holding such a faith in the limitless mold-ability of man is becoming ever more fleeting. The Lysenkoism of the New Soviet Man is a cautionary tale in pursuing such an ostensibly benevolent environmentalist ideology at the expense of obfuscating and silencing good data-driven science on human nature such as what is shared with us here in Blueprint.
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Reviewed in the United States on October 7, 2019 by J. Wells
Format: Paperback
I, like many others, were taught to understand the forces of "nature" and "nurture" as two completely separate, distinct concepts. As I read this book, I imagined everything I had been taught created in to physical items, placed on a table, and having gigantic hands slap down on the table and destroy what was there with new items. Dr. Plomin mentions what he calls "the nature of nurture." The concept is so simple, yet so profound that I can't believe that I didn't understand this concept better before Dr. Plomin mentioned it from other things I had read. Personality traits and IQ have different heritability rates. The personality inclinations and intelligence of parents are largely based in genetics (especially the "g factor" of intelligence,) and these two factors are crucial in how well parents do or don't raise their children. This was an amazing book and, in my opinion, offers an excellent overview of heritability rates for different traits and genetics. It's a simple yet profound notion: nurture has a powerful basis in nature (biology, genes, etc.) The concepts of the book show that different people will have different odds for different outcomes (diseases, aptitudes, strengths, weaknesses, etc.) in life. Dr. Plomin also has the humility to admit what is still not yet understood by scientific research (at least at the time the book hit the printing press, 2018.) Dr. Plomin also took time to explain how DNA research did not reveal the expected answers that researchers thought it would. There are generalist genes, which need many genes for certain traits, and specialist genes, which means that one or a few genes work for one specific thing. Examples of each are given. This is an excellent read.
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Reviewed in the United States on September 28, 2024 by Melissa Oestreich
The author asserts that enduring psychological traits, such as kindness and courage, are primarily determined by genetics. He argues that education and parenting are largely unable to instill these traits because those influences are mostly unstable and inconsistent. Statistically speaking, the author’s claim is probably true on average in the population, but it is not necessarily true at the individual level. While implementing stable and consistent parenting and education can be challenging, it remains achievable. Moreover, individuals can cultivate and sustain their own traits through self-determination, particularly in adulthood, even though significant effort may be required. Overall, the book provides valuable statistical information on the relationship between genetics and personal traits. However, it tends to overgeneralize from the author’s own studies, oversimplify the processes of education and parenting, and neglect the role of willpower in fostering enduring traits.
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Reviewed in the United States on March 16, 2026 by Keith Henry
Format: Paperback
Changed my thoughts on parenting. Helped me with my own DNA discovery about my family. Important work and knowledge that must be shared.
Reviewed in the United States on February 6, 2026 by Maria Leonard Olsen
Format: Hardcover
While it isn;t new and has been braodly known...but society hasn;t been ready for this! The significance of genetics on ALL our psychological profile is greatly influenced by our genes....just like how we know our facial features and other physical attributes are - why would our brains not be? Identical twins (100% same DNA) raised together are approx 80% alike psychologically throughout their lifespan. identical twins raised apart are 70% alike - despite their parents and environment being totally different. These studies involved hundreds of twins - the most reliable results in all of psychology! You will learn a lot from this book. There is no other to consider first on this topic.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 26, 2026 Reviewed in the United States on January 26, 2026 by Helping Families
The author seems to be bothered by the fact that people do not understand the real huge amount of influence our genetics has on our behavior and traits. He gives that so much emphasis, so that one might, as a result, conclude that there is very little importance to our environment. This is a wrong conclusion, and the huge influence that culture has on us, is well researched. The book, even though not claiming that, in any explicit way, might easily lead people to think that way. While as a missioner, the things Plomin stresses and the things that he mentions only brielfly, pose a strong bias, generally the author points out things which are important but are neglected by many people. Our genes do have huge influence on our behavior and traits, and you may find much more on that, in this book. He does mention very briefly that in order to really map the influence of environment, one must do a 2D research which he believes that he knows how to do. Many people tried that and failed, Because of the non-linearity and history dependence, of the complicated gene-environment interaction, a simple statistical 2 dimensional analysis as Plomin believes he can do, would fail to reveal the full interaction. P.S. at some point the author exaplains the meaning of P value, and the explanation that he gives, is wrong and is a common, yet complete misunderstanding. A lot has been said about the lack of good understanding of statistics in these fields, but it was disapointing to see that even famous researchers do this mistake (that is a result of the Bayesian confusion).
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Reviewed in the United States on July 10, 2020 by Zuff
This is a short book and I wish it were longer. Since I started reading it, I've been captivated and keep recommending it to all my friends. I've googled books on genetics + behavior for ages but haven't found a better one that this. The Gene by Siddhartha Mukherjee is a popular choice but having read that one, I found this one to be more informative. The Gene tells too many stories while not explaining the facts clearly but here in Blueprint, Robert Plomin does an excellent job in explaining the concepts not assuming you know them. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough to not just those who are interested in the topic but to everyone just to be able to appreciate how much impact DNA has on humans and no other environmental factor comes even close to this impact.
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Reviewed in the United States on January 7, 2022 by NmL
Format: Hardcover
This book discusses an important topic and one that should inform our policy decisions. Unfortunately it does not and this topic is generally taboo. The bottom line, supported by massive amounts of evidence by the way, is that the most important systematic influences on who we are and what we become our our genes. I give the author high marks for the courage to write this book and the first part of it was really outstanding. I was a little disappointed in the second part because I don't think the author's evidence support some of his conclusions. As of yet the correlations are not strong enough and there's way too much individual variation. To his credit Plomin admits and even shows in graphs the massive amount of overlap between individuals of different groups, but then he makes statements that seem to ignore what he just demonstrated. For example he says based on DNA alone you could predict that he is tall. His polygenic score for height is in the 90th percentile. And he is tall, however his own scatterplot shows a significant portion of the individuals in the 90th percentile of polygenic scores for height around the normal range. And there are plenty of people even below normal. So what you can predict from his DNA alone is that it is more likely than not that he is tall but not with a great deal of confidence. A significant portion of the people in his percentile are not tall. The same problem runs through much of the second part of his book. I do happen to believe that his general theme is correct and that EVENTUALLY polygenic scores will become much more predictive as the data accumulates. When he talks about how genes are responsible for approximately 50% of psychological traits, and how even a significant part of the so-called environmental effect is driven by genes, and finally how most of the rest of the environmental impacts are not systematic and unknown his analysis is outstanding and has powerful implications. This is important and we need to come to terms with it. We just aren't there yet with the predictive power of polygenic scores. And he way over plays its predictive power at the present time. Despite this flaw, overall I think this is an outstanding work and it's very important. I wish this information was much more widely known and accepted because it has important policy implications. I can't give it five stars but I do highly recommend this book.
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Reviewed in the United States on November 21, 2018 by Book Fanatic