Smart kids tend on (balance) to do well in school. That may seem (obvious), but there are a lot of exceptions to that rule. Some kids with high IQs don't ever become (academic) superstars, while less gifted kids often shine. Why would this be?
Psychologists have (focused) on things like self-esteem and confidence--how good kids think they are--to explain these outcomes. And the (assumption) has always been that such psychological traits are shaped (mostly) by parenting--by parents' beliefs and expectations and modeling. But surprisingly this idea had never been scientifically (tested).
Until now. Behavioral geneticist Corina Greven of King's College London and her (colleagues) decided to do the first rigorous (analysis) of the heritability of confidence--and its relationship to IQ and performance.
To do so, they studied more than 3700 pairs of twins, both (identical) and fraternal twins, from age seven to ten. Comparing genetically identical twins to non-identical siblings (allows) scientists to sort out the relative contributions of genes and environment, and when they did this they came up with surprising but (unmistakable) findings.
Contrary of accepted wisdom, the researchers found [and report in the June (issue) of Psychological Science] that kids' confidence is (heavily) influenced by heredity--at least as much as IQ is. Indeed, as-yet-unidentified confidence genes appear to influence school performance independent of IQ genes, with (shared) environment having only a negligible influence.
The fact that confidence is (heritable) does not mean it is unchanging, of course. Siblings share a lot of influences living in basically the same home and (community), but there are always worldly influences pulling them apart. A genetic (legacy) of self-confidence merely opens up many possible futures.
Question)
1. What does the passage talk about?
2. What kind of way to education will be the best?
