"Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are" – The Culmination of 100 Years of Genetic Research. A Groundbreaking Popular Science Book by Robert Plomin for General Readers! To Commemorate the Release, 7,000 Characters of the Prologue Are Now Available for Reading.
Kawade Shobo Shinsha has released the Japanese edition of Robert Plomin's book, "Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are," on March 27, 2026. This popular science work, authored by a world-renowned authority in behavioral genetics, reveals how DNA influences our personality, intelligence, and behavior. To celebrate the launch, the publisher has released a 7,000-character excerpt of the prologue.
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- 📰 Published: March 28, 2026 at 03:31
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Kawade Shobo Shinsha (Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo; Representative Director: Yu Onodera) released the book, "Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are" by Robert Plomin, translated by Fumi Tanaka (list price 2,640 yen including tax), on March 27, 2026.
"Nature or Nurture?"
The scientific answer to this long-standing debate has finally been uncovered.
"Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are," written by the world's leading authority on behavioral genetics, Robert Plomin, who revealed this answer, is his first popular science book written for general readers.
To what extent does genetics influence our personality, intelligence, and behavior, and what is the "DNA revolution" that makes predicting these traits possible? As the culmination of 100 years of genetic research, this book provides an accessible and exciting explanation.
Why are people different from one another?
To what extent do family and upbringing influence us?
Jukyo Ando (Behavioral Geneticist, Professor Emeritus at Keio University), who wrote the commentary, describes this book as "a volume that shakes our worldview" and adds, "Facts can sometimes be unpleasant, but it is no longer possible to run away from them."
To commemorate the release, we are releasing the entire 7,000-character prologue of this global bestseller, which depicts the latest DNA revolution!
We hope you enjoy the essence of this book, which has garnered praise from renowned figures and media around the world, including Steven Pinker (Professor at Harvard University), Steven Mithen (Professor at the University of Reading), and the UK's The Guardian, in addition to Jukyo Ando.
● Commemorating the release: 7,000 characters of the "Blueprint" prologue are now available!
They say there is a new kind of fortune-telling. It claims to be able to predict whether a person is at risk for psychological traits (dispositions or characteristics) such as depression or schizophrenia, or how well they might perform academically. How would you feel if you heard such a thing? That is not all. It seems this fortune-telling can even predict, from the moment a person is born, how much wealth they are likely to accumulate in the future. The reliability is impeccable, and there is no bias. Plus, it only costs 100 pounds.
This may sound like the usual claim made in popular psychology about some trick that will change your life, but in reality, this fortune-telling is based on cutting-edge science. The basis for this fortune-telling is DNA. In recent years, due to the rapid progress in personal genome analysis, we have become able to use DNA as a clue to understand who we are and to predict who we might become in the future. This book introduces this DNA revolution. Because of this revolution, it has become possible to predict a person's psychological strengths and weaknesses at the moment they are born, making DNA an extremely personal issue for us. The DNA revolution is a game-changer with profound implications for psychology, society, and each one of us.
This DNA fortune-telling is the culmination of a century of genetic research aimed at identifying the true nature of what shapes "who we are." When psychology emerged as a scientific field in the early 20th century, the field focused on environmental factors that influence human behavior. For decades, the dominant view in psychology was environmental determinism, which posited that personality is formed by experience. Since Freud, the family environment, or "nurture," was considered the primary factor determining what kind of person one would become. However, in the 1960s, geneticists began to challenge this idea. Although various psychological traits, from mental illness to intellectual ability, are clearly inherited within families, the realization gradually spread that similarities between family members are not solely due to "nurture," but rather to "nature," or genetics. This is because children are genetically about 50% similar to their parents...
"Nature or Nurture?"
The scientific answer to this long-standing debate has finally been uncovered.
"Blueprint: How DNA Makes Us Who We Are," written by the world's leading authority on behavioral genetics, Robert Plomin, who revealed this answer, is his first popular science book written for general readers.
To what extent does genetics influence our personality, intelligence, and behavior, and what is the "DNA revolution" that makes predicting these traits possible? As the culmination of 100 years of genetic research, this book provides an accessible and exciting explanation.
Why are people different from one another?
To what extent do family and upbringing influence us?
Jukyo Ando (Behavioral Geneticist, Professor Emeritus at Keio University), who wrote the commentary, describes this book as "a volume that shakes our worldview" and adds, "Facts can sometimes be unpleasant, but it is no longer possible to run away from them."
To commemorate the release, we are releasing the entire 7,000-character prologue of this global bestseller, which depicts the latest DNA revolution!
We hope you enjoy the essence of this book, which has garnered praise from renowned figures and media around the world, including Steven Pinker (Professor at Harvard University), Steven Mithen (Professor at the University of Reading), and the UK's The Guardian, in addition to Jukyo Ando.
● Commemorating the release: 7,000 characters of the "Blueprint" prologue are now available!
They say there is a new kind of fortune-telling. It claims to be able to predict whether a person is at risk for psychological traits (dispositions or characteristics) such as depression or schizophrenia, or how well they might perform academically. How would you feel if you heard such a thing? That is not all. It seems this fortune-telling can even predict, from the moment a person is born, how much wealth they are likely to accumulate in the future. The reliability is impeccable, and there is no bias. Plus, it only costs 100 pounds.
This may sound like the usual claim made in popular psychology about some trick that will change your life, but in reality, this fortune-telling is based on cutting-edge science. The basis for this fortune-telling is DNA. In recent years, due to the rapid progress in personal genome analysis, we have become able to use DNA as a clue to understand who we are and to predict who we might become in the future. This book introduces this DNA revolution. Because of this revolution, it has become possible to predict a person's psychological strengths and weaknesses at the moment they are born, making DNA an extremely personal issue for us. The DNA revolution is a game-changer with profound implications for psychology, society, and each one of us.
This DNA fortune-telling is the culmination of a century of genetic research aimed at identifying the true nature of what shapes "who we are." When psychology emerged as a scientific field in the early 20th century, the field focused on environmental factors that influence human behavior. For decades, the dominant view in psychology was environmental determinism, which posited that personality is formed by experience. Since Freud, the family environment, or "nurture," was considered the primary factor determining what kind of person one would become. However, in the 1960s, geneticists began to challenge this idea. Although various psychological traits, from mental illness to intellectual ability, are clearly inherited within families, the realization gradually spread that similarities between family members are not solely due to "nurture," but rather to "nature," or genetics. This is because children are genetically about 50% similar to their parents...