Educational Media Reviews Online

This segment from the television newsmagazine 20/20 focuses on the controversial book The Nurture Assumptionand its author, Judith Harris. Harris promotes the idea that parents do not have a lasting influence on their children, but that peer groups do – what she calls group socialization theory. The segment features clips of an interview with Harris, where she outlines the beliefs she expands in the book. The program makes much of the controversy surrounding Harris’s book, providing an expert (Steven Pinker, director of the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience at MIT) who agrees with her and one (Harvard child psychologist Jerome Kagan) who disagrees. The segment also features a class of junior high students talking about who they think most influences their behavior and why.

In general, this exploration is superficial, not going past the opinions to look at where Harris’s theories agree and disagree with research in the field of child development. Some sloppy editing also mars the production. For example, neither packaging or cassette provides the initial broadcast date. The program ends with Hugh Downs urging viewers to go to abcnews.com “this coming Monday” for an online chat with the author, which could and should have been edited out. In spite of its flaws, this program could provide a helpful introduction to Harris’s theories and stimulate debate in undergraduate child development courses where reading the entire book would likely be impractical. Recommended.

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