How Do We Transmit Values?

The mazal vs nurture debate

We all know those amazing parents who get lots of nachat, joy and pride, from their kid’s accomplishments and exemplary life-paths. We may feel a twinge of jealousy, but are we surprised? No! They’re great people, stellar parents, and they’ve invested a lot in their kids. Likewise, we know troubled families whose adult children also struggle. Again, not surprising. And then, there are the occasional mismatched cases: great parents with challenging children, hot-mess parents with model kids.

My husband’s savta recently said, regarding children’s dispositions, “It all depends which star they are born under, on their mazal.”

The rationalist’s eyes might have started bleeding, but really, how is that statement different than voting for nature in the nature/nurture debate? Is it our DNA that determines our destiny or can we improve?

It’s more than an academic debate. For those of us who care deeply about passing on our values, we want to know how to do so.

Many books—and the lives of researchers, activists, and parents—are dedicated to this question. While we can’t cover the full topic of values transmission in a few paragraphs, I propose approaching it in the following way over time. 

First, we ask: what can a parent actually influence in their child’s life?

Economist Bryan Caplan’s research with twins suggests that, assuming a baseline healthy home, nature (as opposed to nurture) predominantly controls outcomes, and parents have minimal influence on their children (Savta called it). However, there are significant caveats to Caplan’s research. For example, he finds that religion is heavily influenced by family. Other research indicates that social norms, particularly around education and achievement, can be shaped by family culture. Norms and family culture encompass a wide range of factors, including environmental ones. Many suggest that the single most important influence parents have on children is the neighborhood they grow up in. Moreover, as most of us can attest, relationships with our families color our entire lives.

Digging into this research helps us focus our energies in the right places. Caplan counters common objections to his findings. For instance, someone might say, “I know a family that worked hard to encourage literacy, with stellar results. They read to their children every night, and now the kids are authors, professors, and very well-read individuals.” Caplan argues that we wrongly attribute this to nurture. Intelligent, well-read parents tend to produce bright offspring with similar tendencies. He makes the same case with personality, athletics, academics, and other traits.

Caplan also acknowledges that intensive effort and money can produce slightly better results, but the gains are often marginal. Additionally, hyper-focus can negatively impact the parent-child relationship, potentially undoing any limited improvements. He illustrates this with the example of young children learning to speak. Intensive effort might lead one twin to speak a few days or weeks before the other, but once the second twin starts talking, their language development trajectories quickly converge.

So, we come to the second question: within the areas of childhood development that we can influence, how do we best do so?

In the coming weeks, I’ll be sharing ideas about family culture. We’ll explore research and stories about nurturing relationships, encouraging education and achievement, and passing on specific types of religious affiliation.

---

What do you think about nature/mazal/DNA vs nurture? What have you read about passing on values? How are you creating family culture? Let me know—I would be glad to share reader feedback and ideas (only with your permission, of course).

Thank you for reading! Share this newsletter with someone who would appreciate insightful discussions on building intentional Jewish families.

You can also connect with The Intentional Jewish Family on Instagram, X, FaceBook, and LinkedIn.

Looking forward to continuing the conversation!