EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19626, 3 May 1927, Page 10

EFFECTS OF ENVIRONMENT.

TRANSFER OF CHILDREN. PARK LANE TO EAST END SLUM. A story of a remarkable and daring experiment concerning the influence of environment on young children was told by the Rev. A. M. Niblock when stressing this phase of town planning at the inaugufal meeting last evening of the Auckland Town Planning Association. Some years ago a professor of the London University arranged for the bringing up by cultured people in the .West End of London of a child born in one of the worst areas of the slums of that city, Mr. Niblock said. At the same time, a child who was born in the West End was taken, how the speaker would not say, to the slums. A close watch was maintained, and at the expiration of eight years it was found the children had grown according to their environment. The child which had been raised in the better surroundings of the West End was in no way distinguishable from those which had been born there, and she had all the attributes one would expect of a. child of cultured and refined parentage. On the other hand, the child of Park Lane, who had been raised in the slums, had absorbed all the evils of that quarter, with its viciousness of thought and tongue. The speaker used the story to point to the mofal that no man could rise superior to liir environment, that it was worth while for the community to cultivate all that was beautiful and to see that the rising generation had the opportunity of growing up under the most inspiring conditions.