High heritability does not imply that environmental interventions to modify a trait are doomed to failure¶

Claim · All claims
Evidence · 1 study (2 entries) · review r2–r3 · q1
Currency · newest study 2017 · not yet checked against its sources · not reviewed by a person

Subclaims¶

q1 i? The article argues it is a mistaken inference to conclude from substantial heritabilities that environmental interventions cannot succeed, since genes may act through modifiable channels. → David Cesarini and Peter M. Visscher 2017

Evidence¶

David Cesarini and Peter M. Visscher 2017¶

David Cesarini and Peter M. Visscher. (2017). Genetics and educational attainment. npj Science of Learning 2:4. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-017-0005-6

q1 · i? · review · r2

Theoretical argument in the review's interpretation section: the authors label the inference from substantial heritabilities to doomed interventions "a common albeit mistaken inference", supporting it with examples rather than new data.

"One common albeit mistaken inference is that since all the four traits studied appear to have substantial heritabilities, efforts to modify them through environmental interventions are doomed to failure."

David Cesarini and Peter M. Visscher 2017 (2)¶

David Cesarini and Peter M. Visscher. (2017). Genetics and educational attainment. npj Science of Learning 2:4. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-017-0005-6

q1 · i? · review · r3

Illustrative counterexample in the same argument: "the provision of eye-glasses could yield large returns" even where "the heritability of eye sight is near 100%".

"For example, the provision of eye-glasses could yield large returns in a population where very few children have eyeglasses and the heritability of eye sight is near 100%."

Discussion¶

Related Claims¶

• Twin and adoption studies suggest that 50–80% of IQ variation is due to genetic differences, with the range reflecting population heritability — related
• Educational achievement is highly heritable, and the common environmental variance is attributable to SES effects — related
• GPAΔ is strikingly highly heritable (85%), exceeding the heritability of achievement itself (67%) — related
• Genetic and environmental variance components of educational achievement decrease with increasing parental SES — related
• Twin-specific shared environments account for a substantial portion of CTD shared-environment estimates for educational attainment and cannot be interpreted as between-family environmental differences — related
• School quality does not moderate genetic and shared-environmental influences on educational performance once moderation by school SES and parental SES is considered — related
• Adjusting published twin-study ACE estimates for assortative mating raises mean heritability by about 17 points and lowers shared environmental estimates by about 16 points — related
• The best-fitting NTFD model estimates heritability of educational attainment at 51% and total shared environmental influence at 26%, disaggregated into twin-specific (16%) and sibling-shared (10%) components — related