a childs development is affected most by?
I am not an expert, there are some of those around. The following is based on my experinece as a teacher and parent:
1) Genetics
2) Early childhood nuturing (touching, stimulation, holding, talking to, etc)
3) Physical and nutritional environment in early childhood, including medical care.
4) Late toddler to Preschool. Nuturing, social contact (vice isolation), vicarious experiences in stories, play, and reading.
5) Preschool nuturing and pre-reading experiences.
6) After 7, the personality and equilibrium seems to be set, and the most important items in developement seems to be nutrition, stability, and social interactions.
Nuture means lack of emotional or physical trama, stable and supportive environment, with a close stable personal relationship with the caregiver. In my experience, it does not matter much who the caregiver is, as long as these are met.
I hope you get some more research based ideas.
I will add a little to the information provided by Bob Pursley. I am not an expert, either, but when I was in college (many years ago)I took a psychology course that dealt with child develoment. The question in those days was what was more important to child development; i.e., environment or heredity. The conclusion in those days was that each was equally important. I don't know if views have changed in the intervening years.
From experience I would second BobP's answer.
Like DrBob222 I had psychology and I think when I had it the argument was leaning more toward heredity, genetics, nature or whatever other term you want to use. I'm really not sure if there is a right answer to this question, or whether there is a provable one at any rate. It seems clear that nature and environment both affect development, but which has the greatest afffect probably varies by child. I don't know how else to answer the question...
how physical environment affects personality