what was the primary finding of the minnesota study of twins reared apart?

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Minnesota Twin Registry

The Minnesota Twin Registry started in 1983 on the premise that all human inquiry is more interesting and informative if twins participate. Its original goal was to establish a registry of all twins born in Minnesota from 1936 to 1955 to be used for psychological enquiry. Recently, information technology has added twins born between 1961 and 1964. It primarily conducts personality and interests tests with its eight,000+ twin pairs and family members via mail. From this project, we were able to confirm that twins and their families are representative of the population and that a poll of their opinions would be more than accurate than polls in the newspaper.

Minnesota Twin Study of Developed Development

The Minnesota Twin Written report of Developed Development began in 1986 to identify what causes individual differences in aging. Study of identical (MZ) and fraternal (DZ) twins allows for estimation of how genes and environment bear on the aging procedure. Some of its preliminary findings are the following: (one) Genetic factors appear to influence personality, mental, and activity-level changes as adults become older; (2) Maintaining an agile lifestyle will contribute to more than successful aging; (3) Continuing to engage in intellectual activities will aid adults retain cognitive functioning as they age; and (4) Keeping an active social life will contribute to stronger feelings of happiness and well existence. This report is directed past Dr. Matt McGue.

Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart

In 1979, T.J. Bouchard began to study twins who were separated at birth and raised in different families. We accept found that an identical twin reared away from his or her co-twin seems to take about an equal chance of beingness similar to the co-twin in terms of personality, interests, and attitudes every bit one who has been reared with his or her co-twin.

This finding leads us to believe that the similarities betwixt twins are due to genes, not surround. Given that the differences between twins reared autonomously must be due totally to the environment, and givne that these twins are simply as like equally twins reared together, we can conclude that the environs, rather than making twins akin, makes them different.

One instance of the amazing similarity of twins reared apart is the so-chosen "Jim twins". These twins were adopted at the age of 4 weeks. Both of the adopting couples, unknown to each other, named their son James. Upon reunion of the twins when they were 39 years one-time, Jim and Jim have learned that:

Both twins are married to women named Betty and divorced from women named Linda.
One has named his get-go son James Alan while the other named his first son James Allan.
Both twins have an adopted brother whose proper noun is Larry.
Both named their pet dog "Toy."
Both had some police-enforcement training and had been a function-fourth dimension deputy sheriff in Ohio.
Each did poorly in spelling and well in math.
Each did carpentry, mechanical drawing, and block lettering.
Each vacation in Florida in the aforementioned three-block-long beach surface area.
Both twins began suffering from tension headaches at xviii, gained ten pounds at the aforementioned fourth dimension, and are half-dozen feet tall and 180 pounds.