The Relationship Code: Deciphering Genetic and Social Influences on Adolescent Development (Adolescent Lives)

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Summary: Scientific spirit of inquiry exploring nature-nurture
Review: This inaugural book of Harvard University Press's new series on Adolescent Lives is a landmark study. It is based on the close cooperation of four separate university research units of "a twelve-year study of a large and scientifically precious national sample of 720 pairs of adolescent siblings and their parents" screened from hundreds of thousands of households. One is left in awe by the humility and caution in drawing inferences, the thoroughness of research and the respect for truth of the scientific spirit of inquiry. Readers are guided through the journey into the mind of the scientists and their various reasons for the methodology and choices for the collaborative project. "The Relationship Code provides a blueprint for what the next two decades of developmental study might bring--more nuanced portrayals of how biological, psychological, and social processes contribute to the unfolding of lives." (Foreword by Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, Columbia University). The book is unique in integrating research on both psychosocial and behavioral genetic influences in adolescent development. In contrast to most traditional studies, it includes step-families of at least 5 years and focused more on nonshared environments in the family, i.e., what is unique to different siblings that may account for individual differences. (E.g., a depressed mother withdraws from one of her children but not another, a child born after a recent death in the family may be treated differently, different peer groups or life events and percetual "bias".) In "thesis", the author reported the impact of environment on psychological development. But in "antithesis", it sheds much light on the genetic influences on the seven measures or domains of adolescent adjustment: antisocial behavior, depression, cognitive agency, sociability, autonomy, social responsibility and self-worth. Also what was formerly considered environmental factors in family systems may have roots in the genes. In "synthesis" it stressed that genetic and family factors are both important. "Our proposal is not simply that the environment has a general and non-specific facilitative or preparatory role in the behavioral expression of genetic influences, but rather that specific family processes may have distinctive and necessary roles in the actual mechanisms of genetic expression. " (p. 420) Relationships seem to encode genetic development and expression--thus the title of the book. Biology is not destiny. Though the authors, as scientists, are still tentative in proposing such hypothesis, the whole nature-nurture debate is henceforth never either-or, but shifted to a more precise level of how after this study. This is a scholarly and technical book. The main author, David Reiss, in four and a half years, has given an excellent report and has painstakingly made the readers' task much easier by presenting most of the data in numerous graphic charts and reserved the tabular data in the appendix. All those interested in education and growth are much indebted to the whole team's contributions, to their "extraordinary synergy of talent, enthusiasm, and dedication, along with grueling and meticulous work" (p. xv).