A5032702365- Genetic Associations and Epidemiology
- Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Genetics and Neurodevelopmental Disorders
- Birth, Development, and Health
- Epigenetics and DNA Methylation
- Health, Environment, Cognitive Aging
- Genetic Mapping and Diversity in Plants and Animals
- Early Childhood Education and Development
- Bullying, Victimization, and Aggression
- Cardiovascular Function and Risk Factors
- Adolescent and Pediatric Healthcare
- Intergenerational and Educational Inequality Studies
- Parental Involvement in Education
- Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
- Obesity, Physical Activity, Diet
- Bioinformatics and Genomic Networks
- Lipoproteins and Cardiovascular Health
- Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder
- Computational Drug Discovery Methods
- Education, Achievement, and Giftedness
- Child Abuse and Trauma
- Diabetes and associated disorders
- Psychological and Temporal Perspectives Research
- Neuroscience, Education and Cognitive Function
King's College London
2014-2023
Medical Research Council
2013-2023
UCB Pharma (Germany)
2023
Genomics (United Kingdom)
2020-2021
Significance Differences among children in educational achievement are highly heritable from the early school years until end of compulsory education at age 16, when UK students assessed nationwide with standard tests [General Certificate Secondary Education (GCSE)]. Genetic research has shown that intelligence makes a major contribution to heritability achievement. However, we show other broad domains behavior such as personality and psychopathology also account for genetic influence on...
A large number of studies document that children differ in the degree they are shaped by their developmental context with some being more sensitive to environmental influences than others.Multiple theories suggest Environmental Sensitivity is a common trait predicting response negative as well positive exposures.However, most research date relied on or less proximal markers Sensitivity.In this paper we introduce new questionnaire-the Highly Sensitive Child (HSC) scale-as promising...
A primary goal of polygenic scores, which aggregate the effects thousands trait-associated DNA variants discovered in genome-wide association studies (GWASs), is to estimate individual-specific genetic propensities and predict outcomes. This typically achieved using a single score, but here we use multi-polygenic score (MPS) approach increase predictive power by exploiting joint multiple discovery GWASs, without assumptions about relationships among predictors. We used summary statistics 81...
There is considerable interest in whether genetic data can be used to improve standard cardiovascular disease risk calculators, as the latter are routinely clinical practice manage preventative treatment.Using UK Biobank resource, we developed our own polygenic score for coronary artery (CAD). We an additional 60 000 individuals develop integrated tool (IRT) that combined with established tools (either American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology pooled cohort equations [PCE] or...
Abstract A genome-wide polygenic score (GPS), derived from a 2013 association study ( N =127,000), explained 2% of the variance in total years education EduYears ). In follow-up =329,000), new GPS explains up to 4%. Here, we tested between this latest and educational achievement scores at ages 7, 12 16 an independent sample 5825 UK individuals. We found that greater amounts over time, 9% age 16, accounting for 15% heritable variance. This is strongest prediction date quantitative behavioral...
One of the best predictors children's educational achievement is their family's socioeconomic status (SES), but degree to which this association genetically mediated remains unclear. For 3000 UK-representative unrelated children we found that genome-wide single-nucleotide polymorphisms could explain a third variance scores on an age-16 UK national examination and half correlation between family SES. Moreover, polygenic based previously published meta-analysis total number years in education...
Genome-wide polygenic scores (GPS), which aggregate the effects of thousands DNA variants from genome-wide association studies (GWAS), have potential to make genetic predictions for individuals. We conducted a systematic investigation associations between GPS and many behavioral traits, phenome. For 3152 unrelated 16-year-old individuals representative United Kingdom, we created 13 largest GWAS psychiatric disorders (for example, schizophrenia, depression dementia) cognitive traits...
Environmental measures used widely in the behavioral sciences show nearly as much genetic influence measures, a critical finding for interpreting associations between environmental factors and children's development. This research depends on twin method that compares monozygotic dizygotic twins, but key aspects of environment such socioeconomic status (SES) cannot be investigated studies because they are same children growing up together family. Here, using new technique applied to DNA from...
Abstract Humans differ substantially in how strongly they respond to similar experiences. Theory suggests that such individual differences susceptibility environmental influences have a genetic basis. The present study investigated the architecture of Environmental Sensitivity (ES) by estimating its heritability, exploring presence multiple heritable components and overlap with common personality traits. ES was measured Highly Sensitive Child (HSC) questionnaire heritability estimates were...
Childhood aggression and its resulting consequences inflict a huge burden on affected children, their relatives, teachers, peers society as whole. Aggression during childhood rarely occurs in isolation is correlated with other symptoms of psychopathology. In this paper, we aim to describe improve the understanding co-occurrence forms We focus behavioural emotional problems, including externalising attention problems anxiety–depression. The data were brought together within EU-ACTION...
We have previously shown that individual differences in educational achievement are highly heritable the early and middle school years UK. The objective of present study was to investigate whether similarly high heritability is found at end compulsory education (age 16) for UK-wide examination, called General Certificate Secondary Education (GCSE). In a national twin sample 11,117 16-year-olds, substantial overall GCSE performance core subjects (58%) as well each them individually: English...
Little is known about the etiology of developmental change and continuity in educational achievement. Here, we study achievement from primary school to end compulsory education for 6000 twin pairs UK-representative Twins Early Development Study sample. Results showed that highly heritable across years subjects studied at (twin heritability ~60%; SNP ~30%); stable (phenotypic correlations ~0.70 ages 7 16). Twin analyses, applying simplex common pathway models, genetic factors accounted most...
The genetic and environmental contributions to the variation longitudinal stability in childhood aggressive behavior were assessed two large twin cohorts, Netherlands Twin Register (NTR), Twins Early Development Study (TEDS; United Kingdom). In NTR, maternal ratings on aggression from Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) available for 10,765 pairs at age 7, 8,557 9/10, 7,176 12. TEDS, parental of conduct disorder Strength Difficulty Questionnaire (SDQ) 6,897 3,028 9 5,716 both studies,...
Abstract Myopia, currently at epidemic levels in East Asia, is a leading cause of untreatable visual impairment. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) adults have identified 39 loci associated with refractive error and myopia. Here, the age-of-onset between genetic variants these was investigated 5200 children assessed longitudinally across ages 7–15 years, along gene-environment interactions involving major environmental risk-factors, nearwork time outdoors. Specific could be categorized...
Although gene-environment correlation is recognized and investigated by family studies recently SNP-heritability studies, the possibility that genetic effects on traits capture environmental risk factors or protective has been neglected polygenic prediction models. We covariation between trait-associated variation identified genome-wide association (GWASs) specific exposures, controlling for overall relatedness using a genomic matrix restricted maximum-likelihood model. In UK-representative...
On average, students attending selective schools outperform their non-selective counterparts in national exams. These differences are often attributed to value added by the school, as well factors use select pupils, including ability, achievement and, cases where charge tuition fees or located affluent areas, socioeconomic status. However, possible role of DNA between different types has not yet been considered. We used a UK-representative sample 4814 genotyped investigate exam performance...
We used a case–control genome-wide association (GWA) design with cases consisting of 1238 individuals from the top 0.0003 (~170 mean IQ) population distribution intelligence and 8172 unselected population-based controls. The single-nucleotide polymorphism heritability for extreme IQ trait was 0.33 (0.02), which is highest so far cognitive phenotype, significant genetic correlations 0.78 were observed educational attainment 0.86 IQ. Three variants in locus ADAM12 achieved significance,...
Associations between exposures and outcomes reported in epidemiological studies are typically unadjusted for genetic confounding. We propose a two-stage approach estimating the degree to which such observed associations can be explained by First, we assess attenuation of exposure effects regressions controlling increasingly powerful polygenic scores. Second, use structural equation models estimate confounding using heritability estimates derived from both SNP-based twin-based studies....