Heredity: Lay Understanding

Martin PM Richards, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

Published online: September 2006

DOI: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0005873

There is a general knowledge of inheritance among the lay public that conflicts with scientific Mendelian accounts and may impede the uptake of scientific explanations. There is a strong case for a ‘bottom-up’ approach to genetic education, which takes account of varying needs and interests in genetic knowledge as well as lay knowledge of inheritance.

Keywords: inheritance; kinship; lay knowledge; public understanding of science; Mendelian inheritance

 References
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 Further Reading
    Clough EE and Wood-Robinson C (1994) Young people's ideas about inheritance and evolution. Studies in Science Education 24: 29–47.
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    Kerr A, Cunningham-Burley S and Amos A (1998) The new genetics and health: mobilizing lay expertise. Public Understanding of Science 7: 41–60.
    book Marteau T and Richards MPM (eds.) (1996) The Troubled Helix. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
    Parsons E and Atkinson P (1992) Lay construction of genetic risk. Sociology of Health and Illness 14: 437–455.
    book Rapp R (1992) "Heredity or: revising the facts of life". In: Yanogisako S and Delaney C (eds.) Naturalizing Power. Essays in Feminist Cultural Analysis, chap. 6, pp. 69–86. New York, NY: Routledge.
    Richards MPM (1998) Annotation: genetic research, family life and clinical practice. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 39: 291–305.
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    book Sneider DM (1968) American Kinship: A Cultural Account. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
    book Strathern M (1992) After Nature: English Kinship in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
    Wood-Robinson C (1994) Young people's ideas about inheritance and evolution. Studies in Science Education 24: 29–47.
    Wynne B (1991) Knowledge in context. Science, Technology and Human Values 16: 111–121.
    book Wynne B (1995) "Public understanding of science". In: Jasanoff S, Markle GE, Petersen JC and Finch J (eds.) Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, chap. 7, pp. 112–128. London, UK: Sage.

Related Sub-Topics:

General Genetics and Disease | Science and Society - General | Philosophy of the Life Sciences
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Article Title: Heredity: Lay Understanding
 
How to Cite close
Richards, Martin PM(Sep 2006) Heredity: Lay Understanding. In: eLS. John Wiley & Sons Ltd, Chichester. http://www.els.net [doi: 10.1002/9780470015902.a0005873]