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That's not quite as strong of a question, since trees (as far as I know) don't regrow the same pattern of branches and leaves repetitively, yet fingerprints remain roughly the same throughout one's life despite skin constantly shedding and regrowing.

Which is also an interesting question.

Except that in your example, the trees are influencing by environmental factors throughout their life, whereas the first sentence of this article says it's environmental factors in utero that influences fingerprints.

Fingerprints form while in the uterus. The location of a tree's first leaf will be influenced by the factors up until that time. It's still the same thing. Leaves won't move around from branch to branch.

It isn't a perfect analogy, but it still works. The only reason the other option, "development is completely random" isn't the right answer is because of the word "completely."

Honestly, the survey question is poorly asked, and doesn't produce a particularly interesting discussion. Maybe something was lost in translation.