436 Iv. COGNITI vE AND M OTIvATIONAL P ROCESSES
gotic twins (Barbot & Eff, 2019; Johnson & 
Bouchard, 2014). Therefore, it now appears 
rather likely that at least a portion of what 
it takes to display creativity, outstanding or 
otherwise, arises from our genes (Simon -
ton, 1999, 2008, 2014a). In fact, research in 
behavioral genetics suggests that some so- 
called “environmental” factors might actu -
ally be genetic in their underlying causality 
(Plomin & Bergeman, 1991; Scarr & Mc -
Cartney, 1983). There are two main ways 
this can happen:
1. Offspring obtain their genotypes 
from the parental genotypes. The parental 
genotype is also associated with a particu -
lar parental phenotype, part of which may 
leave an imprint on the home environment. 
For instance, highly intelligent parents will 
more likely have more intellectual and cul -
tural hobbies and recreational activities. As 
a consequence, the home may be filled with 
books, magazines, art prints, and music re -
cordings (e.g., Terman, 1925). This available 
stimulation may then be improperly given all 
of the credit for the appearance of a young 
genius. Yet the apparent connection may be 
partly or completely spurious from a causal 
standpoint. It is the shared genotype, not the 
home circumstances per se, that may be re -
sponsible for the bulk of the developmental 
effect.
2. Even more dramatically, we must rec -
ognize that a person’s genotype helps shape 
the environment in which the phenotype 
must emerge. Children or adolescents are 
not passive receptacles for events impinging 
on some tabula rasa ; rather, these youth are 
acting upon their world, trying to make it 
conform more closely to their abilities and 
interests. They may ask their parents to pro -
vide them with music lessons, to purchase 
certain books or magazines, to visit science 
or art museums, and so forth. Indeed, there 
is ample anecdotal evidence that gifted chil -
dren often continue to pursue activities in 
the face of active parental discouragement. 
Blaise Pascal continued to study mathemat -
ics on his own even after his father delib -
erately hid books on that subject, believing 
that his son was slighting classical studies. 
So Pascal independently invented a large 
portion of Euclidean geometry.It is crucial to recognize the possibil -
ity that genes might affect the environment 
in a manner that sometimes is extremely 
subtle and therefore not easily deciphered. 
Take, for instance, research suggesting that 
creative geniuses exhibit higher rates of or -
phanhood or parental loss in childhood or 
adolescence (e.g., Eisenstadt, 1978). This 
might be seen as an obvious case of a nur -
ture effect, and this developmental influ -
ence is often so interpreted (e.g., Damian 
& Simonton, 2014). Presumably such trau -
matic experiences can dramatically change 
the course of personality development. Nev -
ertheless, it can be readily argued that this 
linkage represents a hidden genetic effect. To 
provide but one such alternative interpreta -
tion, we know that the parents of geniuses 
tend to have gotten married later in life and 
to have had their offspring at later ages than 
is the norm (Bowerman, 1947; Ellis, 1926; 
Galton, 1874; Raskin, 1936). This may sim -
ply reflect the fact that highly intelligent 
and ambitious people tend to delay fam -
ily responsibilities until they have fully es -
tablished their careers. If so, then when all 
other factors are held constant, it could be 
that this phenomenon alone might account 
for the higher incidence of parental loss. The 
traumatic event itself has no developmental 
consequence. What does have an effect is 
that the young genius inherited those quali -
ties that enable him or her to succeed in life, 
such as intelligence and drive.
Of course, at present, we cannot say with 
any precision precisely the relative contribu -
tions of nature and nurture to creative de -
velopment. Insofar as creativity depends on 
intellectual growth, then the genetic contri -
bution should be substantial. After all, intel -
ligence features among the highest heritabil -
ity coefficients of all individual-  difference 
variables germane to either creativity or 
genius (Johnson & Bouchard, 2014). At the 
same time, the heritability coefficients for 
motives, dispositions, interests, and values 
are rather less prominent, with genes at best 
accounting for only half as much variance as 
they account for in intellectual traits (John -
son & Bouchard, 2014). Thus, the determi -
nation of the comparative impact of nature 
and nurture for creativity must depend on 
the determination of the relative importance 
of the diverse characteristics that enter into 