Before we are born, these genes also begin giving the orders to shape the initial patterns in which our nerve cells wire together. Beginning around the sixth month in utero, an infant’s brain is following her parents’ uniquely combined genetic instructions to lay down patterns of prewired synaptic connections. Through this process, in a most simplistic explanation, her brain’s neurons begin to assemble and organize to reflect portions of her parents’ combined genetic blueprints. The blueprints of the child’s genetic map become a completely unique makeup, allowing the child to express a
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