Role of Genes in Child's Education

A child's educational success depends on the genes they haven't inherited from their parents, as well as the genes they have inherited, according to a new study led by UCL researchers.

The study confirms that genes a person inherits directly are most likely to contribute to their achievements in education, is published in the American Journal of Human Genetics.

‘The nature (the genes they inherit) and nurture (the environment they grow up in) effects are intertwined in educational success.’

Mothers and fathers each pass on half of their genes to their children, and although the other half of their genes are not passed on, they continue to influence the parents' traits and ultimately influence the traits in their children.

The influence of parents' genes on outcomes for their offspring by shaping the environment they provide for them is called genetic nurture.It describes how parents' genes indirectly affect their children's characteristics.

For this study, researchers reviewed and analyzed 12 studies in several countries and used polygenic scoring to study the influence of millions of genetic variants on educational attainment in nearly 40,000 parent and child pairs.

They found that genetic nurture had about half as much impact on education success as genetic inheritance. Genetic nurture effects captured by polygenic scores in the studies explained at least 1.28% of variance in educational outcomes, while direct genetic effects explained at least 2.89% of variance in educational outcomes.

These findings are underestimated because polygenic scores capture only a fraction of heritability in educational outcomes; the actual genetic effects could be multiple times higher, but direct genetic effects would probably still be roughly double those of genetic nurture effects.

This study illustrates the complex relationship between genes and the environment. Although our study uses genetic methods, it provides strong evidence that genetics and the environment really matters when we talk about education.

It is really important to understand how educational attainment (years of education, highest degree obtained) and achievement (scores and grades achieved) are passed on through families, and how this knowledge could help us break cycles of disadvantage across generations.

First author of the paper, Dr Biyao Wang (UCL Psychology & Language Sciences) said: "It is too early yet to say whether the most important is what happens within the family (such as parents reading to their children) or outside the family (such as parents choosing the best school and activities)".

Next, researchers hope to work on pathways through which genetic nurture operates, if it changes during different stages of development, and identify what aspects of the environment are most important. This will be key to designing new interventions to encourage and support all children to succeed.



Source: Medindia