Genetic Influence on Human Psychological Traits

Abstract

There is now a large body of evidence that supports the conclusion that individual differences in most, if not all, reliably measured psychological traits, normal and abnormal, are substantively influenced by genetic factors. This fact has important implications for research and theory building in psychology, as evidence of genetic influence unleashes a cascade of questions regarding the sources of variance in such traits. A brief list of those questions is provided, and representative findings regarding genetic and environmental influences are presented for the domains of personality, intelligence, psychological interests, psychiatric illnesses, and social attitudes. These findings are consistent with those reported for the traits of other species and for many human physical traits, suggesting that they may represent a general biological phenomenon.

Keywords

behavior genetics heritability individual differences

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Bouchard

T.J.

Jr. McGue

(2003). (See References)

Carey

(2003). Human genetics for the social sciences. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Plomin

DeFries

J.C.

Craig

I.W.

McGuffin

(Eds.). (2003). Behavioral genetics in the post genomic era. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

Rutter

Pickels

Murray

Eaves

L.J.

(2001). Testing hypotheses on specific environmental causal effects on behavior. Psychological Bulletin, 127, 291–324.

Boomsma

D.I.

Busjahn

Peltonen

(2002). Classical twin studies and beyond. Nature Reviews: Genetics, 3, 872–882.

Bouchard

T.J.

Jr. McGue

(2003). Genetic and environmental influences on human psychological differences. Journal of Neurobiology, 54, 4–45.

Caspi

Sugden

Moffitt

T.E.

Taylor

Craig

I.W.

Harrington

McClay

Mill

Martin

Braiwaite

Poulton

(2003). Influence of life stress on depression: Moderation by a polymorphism in the 5-HTT gene. Science, 301, 386–389.

Evans

G.W.

(2004). The environment of childhood poverty. American Psychologist, 59, 77–92.

Hur

Y.-M.

Bouchard

T.J.

Jr. Lykken

D.T.

(1998). Genetic and environmental influence on morningness-eveningness. Personality and Individual Differences, 25, 917–925.

10.

Khoury

M.J.

(1998). Genetic epidemiology. In

Rothman

K.J.

Greenland

(Eds.), Modern epidemiology (pp.609–622). Philadelphia: Lippincott-Raven.

11.

Lowrey

P.L.

Takahashi

J.S.

(2000). Genetics of the mammalian circadian system: Photic entrainment, circadian pacemaker mechanisms, and postranslational regulation. Annual Review of Genetics, 34, 533–562.

12.

Lynch

Walsh

(1998). Genetics and analysis of quantitative traits. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer.

13.

Marcus

(2004). The birth of the mind: How a tiny number of genes creates the complexities of human thought. New York: Basic Books.

14.

Meehl

P.E.

(1978). Theoretical risks and tabular asterisks: Sir Karl, Sir Ronald, and the slow progress of soft psychology. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 46, 806–834.

15.

Ridley

(2003). Nature via nurture: Genes, experience and what makes us human. New York: HarperCollins.

16.

Rutter

(2002). Nature, nurture, and development: From evangelism through science toward policy and practice. Child Development, 73, 1–21.

17.

Wolf

J.B.

Brodie

E.D.I.

Wade

M.J.

(Eds.). (2000). Epistasis and the evolutionary process. New York: Oxford University Press.