Hi Scrap - Well being in plant science the genetic inheritance of behavioural patterns is not my area but I do think with most things the final outcome is a mixture of genetics and environment. Many things will have an element each way just as we might all have physical tendencies towards particular health problems and behavioural management may or may not be enough to prevent us from actually getting them.

The difficult part is separating/ standardizing the environmental aspect from the genetic when studying it. Basically impossible unless you get a pair of identical twins to work with. You haven't ever trained identical twins by any chance? :-)

I guess I would think most things could be trained to a degree but some would be more difficult due to a lifetime of behavioural patterns shaped by what we are genetically more likely to be good at and a few purely genetic factors.

As for specific examples guess reflex action might be one thing you could train physically to a point and then it's more a matter of knowing how to make the most of the reflexes you have by improving the choice of how you respond. You might start by learning to relax and focus to increase you reflex speed and then learn to fine tune your timing and most appropriate response choice.

I do also think that certain personality traits especially those associated with addictive behaviour might be partially genetic. My own family might be an example of this - 3/4 of the kids in my family have competed at a national level in their sports (all different). Sport was our chosen outlet but for my grandmother it was alcohol, for my grandfather it was work and I could go on listing obsessive bahaviours of my family members. It could work out well or badly depending on our choices but we definately have an unusually obsessive family. I have always been involved in sport for myself - not anyone else - so I do think it's a genetic compulsion - we just can't leave it alone. We've all suffered different training induced injuries aswell since we are not good at stopping when we're told!

So basically I'd say there's some genetic component to most things although environmental factors aswell as deliberate psychological tactics such as positive thought etc can play a big part. Would you agree with that Scrap?