Similar Genes, Different Personalities

By LISA BELKIN

I had an NPR driveway moment earlier this week, listening to a piece by Alix Spiegel about why siblings are so different.

After all, she points out, you are far more likely to share physical characteristics with a sibling than you are with someone randomly chosen from the population. This is dramatically true of cognitive abilities as well.
But personality? Studies have found that when it comes to things like extroversion or conscientiousness, siblings are similar only 20 percent of the time, which is only the slightest bit higher than a comparison to a random stranger.

At first that sounds impossible. Wouldn’t people who share genes and parents and a childhood home be likely to turn out alike?

Then I thought of my own family. My brother and sister and I do look alike, and (though we would not have conceded this when we were much younger) we are all similar in intelligence. But in so many other ways we are opposites. Get the three of us together and at least someone in the room can be described as garrulous or taciturn, cheap or indulgent, meticulous or sloppy, dramatic or cool. A Venn diagram would have some overlap, but not much. How is this possible?

There are three theories, Spiegel reports. The first, known as “divergence,” postulates that children are competing for their parents’ “time, love and attention,” and, as Darwin pointed out, organisms tend to “diverge” and specialize to minimize direct competition. “So if one child in a family seems to excel at academics,” Spiegel says, “the other child — consciously or unconsciously — will specialize in a different area, like socializing.”

The second theory, that of a nonshared environment, argues that we only seem to be “growing up in the same family as our siblings,” when in fact we are being raised in measurably different households. We experience the same events at different ages; we have different numbers of older and younger siblings; we are born to different parents — older or younger, wealthier or struggling, happier or less so, more experienced, less energetic.

And, finally, there is the theory of “exaggeration.” It is similar in result to “divergence,” though different in its cause. A child who might be considered outgoing and social in a family of introverts, becomes the “quiet one” in a family of extroverts. She then thinks of herself that way, chooses quieter friends and gradually becomes somewhat quieter. (As parents we are supposed to make sure this doesn’t happen — that we don’t compare our children. That is, of course, impossible. But it’s the reason I’m not mentioning my own children in this post. Exaggeration and divergence may be the natural order of things, but declaring in print that one child is vanilla and the other is chocolate is still a bad idea.)

NPR is spending the week looking at siblings. Apt timing. As Spiegel said:
…as you eat your turkey, look across the table. There, you may see a brother, a sister, a step-sibling, a twin. And maybe they’re your friend, and maybe they’re your enemy, but one thing is for certain: Their very existence has had a profound influence on your life.

Woman's cellphone swallowed by crocodile ringing

Here's something strange that shows how sturdy some Nokia phones can be. There can be crocodile resistant!

A crocodile named Gena at an aquarium in Dnipropetrovsk, Ukraine swallowed the mobile phone nearly a month back when a visitor, Rimma Golovko trying to photograph the reptile dropped it in the water, according to several media reports.

The zoo authorities did not believe the woman that the 14-year-old toothy reptile ate her Nokia phone until they called it and heard it ringing inside the croc's stomach.

An aquarium employee Alexandra was quoted by the Associated Press as saying, “The phone started ringing and the sound was coming from inside our Gena's stomach, and we understood s[he] wasn't lying."
Surprisingly, the device survived the amphibious reptile's teeth and acids in stomach.

Despite being the leader of the group, Gena has not been playing with other fellow African crocodiles. Apparently he is depressed and in pain after swallowing the device.

Croc in pain?

Though the phone has not been damaged, Gena has been unwell. Since the incident, the crocodile has refused to eat food, and has become silent.

The doctors have tried feeding him live quail, which was injected with vitamins and a laxative, but Gena did not eat it.

Alexandra added, "His behavior has changed. He moves very little and swims much less than he used to.”
Despite being the leader of the group, Gena has not been playing with other fellow African crocodiles. Apparently he is depressed and in pain after swallowing the device.

According to Eduard Manukyan, aquarium's representative, the crocodile's condition has been worsening day by day.

Gena may undergo operation

If the croc continues refusing to eat, he will be taken for an X-ray next week.
Currently, the authorities are trying to warm up the air and water to speed up Gena's digestion.

Removing the cellphone through operation will be the last resort, as a surgery in reptiles usually take around three weeks to heal. Also, the move can prove dangerous both for the Gena and the vets.
Dnipropetrovsk chief veterinarian Oleksandr Shushlenko stated that whether the crocodile will undergo surgery or not will depend on where the celephone is located.

He added, "We don't have much experience working with such large animals."

The zoo administrators stated, “We have ordered special transport to bring Gena to the vet.
"We pray only that he survived the operation. We are so worried about him.”

Meanwhile Golovko is only worried about her cellphone and wants to get it back, as it has her contacts and memorable photographs.

Is time running out for the wristwatch?

One in seven people in the UK have no need for a watch, a survey suggests. Are mobile phone time displays killing off the wristwatch?

For decades, people have sworn they would be lost without one.

A faulty movement or dead battery sent them scurrying to the watch repairers, desperate to restore to their lives the order of a regular tick.

And in today's time-poor society, the need to keep tabs on the passing minutes is greater than ever.
But according to market analyst Mintel, the growth of portable digital products - phones, laptops, MP3 players - with time displays represents a gathering cloud over the watch industry.

In its survey of more than 1,500 people in the UK, 14% said they had no need for a watch. Mirrored across the country, that would amount to 7.2 million people, while the percentage doubled among 15 to 24-year-old.

Mintel's analysts believe this will continue, with market figures showing a 9% increase in mobile phone ownership since 2005. The number of watch owners remained static.

"It's a growing trend that... is a potential threat to demand for standard wristwatches," says Mintel's Tamara Sender. "Young people who have grown up with technology are just as likely to check the time with a mobile phone."

Watches remain popular - 86% of people still own one, even if many of those last saw their timepiece buried somewhere in their sock drawer. Sales are expected to hold up - if not grow - as people replace broken ones.

But the concept of the watch could change, says Ms Sender.

Mintel cites as an example the new iPod nano, a miniaturised version of Apple's popular digital music player, which features a watch face and a clip on the back allowing it to be worn with a wrist-strap.

Such convergence of technology - as with phones, cameras, MP3 players and internet applications - is inevitable, according to Dr Ben Highmore.

Wristwatches are becoming "redundant" and will probably disappear in the coming decades, believes the cultural trends lecturer at the University of Sussex. "If you're in the habit of wearing a watch, you'll continue."

Digital natives

"But if you're growing up as a 'digital native' with a mobile phone and you don't get into that habit, then it's a leap to buy one.

Even so, he admits: "Buying a Rolex isn't about knowing the time." It's bound up with one of the historical reasons for carrying a watch - status.

At the beginning of the 20th Century the fashion was for pocket watches, says Jonathan Scatchard, author of Miller's guide to wristwatches.

"It was a bit of a rite of passage; a real man had a chain with a watch hanging from it," he says. During World War I, the practicalities of trench warfare led soldiers to attach them to the wrist with leather straps.

But it was not until improved technology, such as the self-winding mechanism, allowed for smaller, more convenient pieces, that they became the norm.

"Even in the late 1920s it could be thought of as a little bit effeminate if a man wore a wristwatch," says Mr Scatchard, who runs a website dedicated to another vintage status brand, Heuer.

Traditional wristwatches have seen off the threat of technology before - when consumers in the 1980s enjoyed an intense if short interest in the Japanese-pioneered digital watches - and will do again, he says.
"The fascination is with something made by hand that has a tick; almost like a heartbeat," he says.

"We all have mobile phones but they are out of date in two years and you never get attached to them."

Designer pull


But are pricey, carefully-crafted timepieces really likely to win over the emerging generation of wristwatch refuseniks?

While acknowledging this is the preserve of wealthy adults, Mr Scatchard says: "As younger people get older and start to have a bit more money, their attitudes will change."

It's a sentiment echoed by veteran watch repairer Robin Martin, who has experienced the industry's ups and downs from his Portsmouth repair shop since 1959.

"Absolute rubbish" is his response to the question of whether watch-wearing is in decline. "We're busier today than ever before. I haven't found any drop-off in use, even at the younger end," he says.

If young people are to be won over it will be through designer brands according to Mintel.
A quarter of those aged 15 to 24 preferred designer labels, although prices would likely put off young teenage buyers like the readers of Sugar magazine.

"Girls just want something bright and fancy, maybe with a bit of 'bling'," says Jo Sawkins, fashion editor at Sugar, adding that many girls choose cheap imitations of designer watches worn by celebrities.

Casio is tapping in to that youth market by using young stars such as singers Ke$ha and Pixie Lott to promote its Baby-G range of durable, brightly-coloured watches. But while some are available under £50, many cost more.

"Unless it's a birthday or Christmas gift, when it's something parents would spend money on, I don't know that a watch is something they would buy," says Ms Sawkins.

"It gets more to do with status the older they get."

Whether they come to view watches as essential in the way their parents did, however, only time will tell.

Source"BBC"