Comment on the UK twin study on Genetics and educational outcomes.

I thought it relevant to put directly into my blog the introduction from the twin study concerning educational outcomes and genetics

The PLOS one URL is given below.

The findings of this study will not be a surprise to those studying/involved in the analysis of the biological parameters influencing reading performance. 

Strong Genetic Influence on a UK Nationwide Test of Educational Achievement at the End of Compulsory Education at Age 16

·         Nicholas G. Shakeshaft mail,

·         Maciej Trzaskowski,

·         Andrew McMillan,

·         Kaili Rimfeld,

·         Eva Krapohl,

·         Claire M. A. Haworth,

·         Philip S. Dale,

·         Robert Plomin

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0080341

Introduction

Children differ in their success in learning what is taught at school – skills such as reading and mathematics, and knowledge such as scientific theories and historical facts. To what extent are these individual differences in educational achievement due to nurture or nature? As academic skills and knowledge are taught at school but are seldom explicitly or systematically taught outside of school, it would be reasonable to assume that differences between students in how much they learn are due to differences in how well the educational system teaches these skills and knowledge. From this perspective, it is surprising that quantitative genetic research such as the twin method, which compares identical and fraternal twins, indicates that individual differences in educational achievement are substantially due to genetic differences (heritability) and only modestly due to differences between schools and other environmental differences [1]. For example, we have recently shown in a UK sample of 7,500 pairs of twins assessed longitudinally at ages 7, 9 and 12 that individual differences in literacy and numeracy are significantly and substantially heritable [2]. Across the three ages, the average heritability of literacy and numeracy was 68%, which means that two-thirds of the individual differences (variance) in children's performance on tests of school achievement can be ascribed to genetic differences – i.e., inherited differences in DNA sequence – between them. Remarkably, educational achievement was found to be more heritable than intelligence (68% versus 42%), even though intelligence is not taught directly in schools and is generally viewed as an aptitude of individuals rather than an outcome of schooling.

Although earlier genetic research on school achievement produced a wide range of estimates of heritability, sampling issues may have masked a more consistent pattern. For example, a classic twin study of school achievement found heritabilities of about 40% for English and mathematics in a study of more than 2000 twin pairs [3]. However, heritability estimates in this study are likely to be underestimates due to restriction of range, because the sample was restricted to the highest-achieving high-school twins in the U.S., those who had been nominated by their schools to compete for the National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. The wide range of heritability estimates in three other twin studies of general educational achievement is likely to be due to their small sample sizes, which were underpowered to provide reliable point estimates of heritability: Petrill et al., 2010 (314 pairs) [4]; Thompson, Detterman, & Plomin, 1991 (278 pairs) [5]; Wainwright, Wright, Luciano, Geffen, & Martin, 2005 (390 pairs) [6].

In addition to the UK study mentioned above which showed high heritability (68%) for literacy and numeracy (Kovas et al., in press; 7,500 pairs) [2], a study of twins in Australia, the US and Scandinavia has reported high heritability (77%) for reading at age 8 (Byrne et al., 2009; 615 pairs) [7] and in the US at age 10 (Olson et al., 2011; 489 pairs) [8]. Similarly high heritability (62%) has been reported for science performance in 9-year old twins (Haworth et al., 2008; 2602 pairs) [9]. A Dutch study of 12-year-old twins reported a heritability of 60% for a national test of educational achievement (Bartels et al., 2002; 691 pairs) [10]. Another study of general educational achievement in 12-year-old twins in the Netherlands (1,178 pairs) and in the UK (3,102 pairs) did not have zygosity information (Calvin et al., 2012) [11]. However, these studies estimated identical and fraternal twin resemblance from the proportion of same-sex and opposite-sex twins, and this procedure yielded heritability estimates of about 60% in the Dutch sample and 65% in the UK sample.

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the extent to which the remarkably high heritabilities for educational achievement in the UK persist to the end of compulsory education. Unlike many countries such as the US, the UK has a nationwide examination for educational achievement, called the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE), which most pupils complete at the end of compulsory education, typically at age 16. The GCSE provides a valuable test of the hypothesis of strong genetic influence on educational achievement because the GCSE is administered nationwide under standardised conditions. Furthermore, the GCSE is important for individuals, for society, and for government because it is used to make decisions about further education.

On the basis of the evidence from earlier school years – most specifically, in our research on educational achievement in the UK at ages 7, 9 and 12 – we tested the hypothesis that the high heritability of educational achievement persists to the end of compulsory education, as assessed by the GCSE at age 16. Additional support for this hypothesis comes from a recent report extending the analysis of the UK dataset described above [11] to total GCSE scores at age 16 [12]. As in the previous report for this dataset, zygosity information was not available, but estimating identical and fraternal resemblance from the proportion of same-sex and opposite-sex twins suggested substantial genetic influence on GCSE scores [12]. Although heritability was not reported because of the absence of zygosity information, the imputed correlations for identical and fraternal twins suggest a heritability of about 60%. However, a definitive estimate of the heritability of educational achievement can only be made on the basis of evidence from twins with known zygosity, which was achieved by the present study.