Everyone is confused at the magnificence and madness of human behaviour, yet the mental profession fails to help us understand it. We know about body organs and limbs, but little about our minds, mental illness and human behaviour. The Origins of Human Behaviour is written in plain English to help us understand how we evolve into the person we become. It sets out to find and explain the major influences, and demonstrates that the origins of human behaviour contain some genuine surprises. Just what are the origins of our myriad personal qualities? Author Bernard Rourke never accepted that living in slums and suffering abuse are principal factors in creating a person’s character and temperament. There had to be other more dramatic sources of influence. He examines the role of instinct and other inheritance issues in the animal kingdom, because he believes what has been successful for millions of years might well have carried over into our species. Is human behaviour environmental or ancestral, and what makes us unique individuals? The book also discusses the value of the world’s main religions and what influence we really have in our children’s personal development.
