TY - JOUR
T1 - Genetic associations with parental investment from conception to wealth inheritance in six cohorts
AU - Wertz, Jasmin
AU - Moffitt, Terrie E.
AU - Arseneault, Louise
AU - Barnes, J.C.
AU - Boivin, Michel
AU - Corcoran, David
AU - Danese, Andrea
AU - Hancox, Robert J
AU - Harrington, Honalee
AU - Houts, Renate
AU - Langevin, Stephanie
AU - Liu, Hexuan
AU - Poulton, Richie
AU - Sugden, Karen
AU - Tanksley, Peter T.
AU - Williams, Benjamin
AU - Caspi, Avshalom
N1 - Acknowledgements: This study uses data from the Dunedin and E-Risk cohorts, the ALSPAC cohort, the MCS cohort, the HRS cohort and the WLS cohort. The Dunedin and E-Risk cohorts are supported by grants from the National Institute on Aging (grant no. AG032282), the National Institute of Child Health and Development (grant nos. HD077482 and HD32948), the UK Medical Research Council (grant nos. MR/P005918/1 and G1002190) and the Jacobs Foundation. The Dunedin Research Unit is additionally supported by the New Zealand Health Research Council (programme grant no. 16-604) and New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. The Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Research Unit at University of Otago is within the Ngāi Tahu tribal area who we acknowledge as first peoples, tangata whenua (translation, ‘people of this land’). The ALSPAC cohort receives core support from the UK Medical Research Council and Wellcome Trust (grant no. 217065/Z/19/Z) and the University of Bristol. ALSPAC GWAS data were generated by Sample Logistics and Genotyping Facilities at Wellcome Sanger Institute and LabCorp (Laboratory Corporation of America) using support from 23andMe and funding by Wellcome Trust WT088806 (for mother GWAS data). A comprehensive list of ALSPAC funding is available on the ALSPAC website (http://www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/external/documents/grant-acknowledgements.pdf). The MCS cohort is funded by grants from the Economic and Social Research Council. The HRS is supported by National Institute on Aging grant nos. U01AG009740, RC2AG036495 and RC4AG039029 and is conducted by the University of Michigan. The WLS is supported by National Institute on Aging grant nos. R01AG041868 and P30AG017266. The WLS genetic data are sponsored by the National Institute on Aging (grant nos. R01AG009775, R01AG033285 and R01AG041868) and was conducted by the University of Wisconsin. This work used a high-performance computing facility partially supported by grant no. 2016-IDG-1013 (‘HARDAC+, Reproducible HPC for Next-Generation Genomics’) from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center. We acknowledge the assistance of the Duke Molecular Physiology Institute Molecular Genomics Core for the generation of data for the paper. This research benefitted from GWAS results made publicly available by the SSGAC https://www.thessgac.org/. J.W. received support from an AXA Research Fund postdoctoral fellowship and from the Jacobs Foundation. A.D. is funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Biomedical Research Centre at South London and Maudsley National Health Service Foundation Trust and King’s College London.
PY - 2023/6/29
Y1 - 2023/6/29
N2 - Genetic inheritance is not the only way parents’ genes may affect children. It is also possible that parents’ genes are associated with investments into children’s development. We examined evidence for links between parental genetics and parental investments, from the prenatal period through to adulthood, using data from six population-based cohorts in the UK, US and New Zealand, together totalling 36,566 parents. Our findings revealed associations between parental genetics—summarized in a genome-wide polygenic score—and parental behaviour across development, from smoking in pregnancy, breastfeeding in infancy, parenting in childhood and adolescence, to leaving a wealth inheritance to adult children. Effect sizes tended to be small at any given time point, ranging from RR = 1.12 (95% confidence interval (95%CI) 1.09, 1.15) to RR = 0.76 (95%CI 0.72, 0.80) during the prenatal period and infancy; β = 0.07 (95%CI 0.04, 0.11) to β = 0.29 (95%CI 0.27, 0.32) in childhood and adolescence, and RR = 1.04 (95%CI 1.01, 1.06) to RR = 1.11 (95%CI 1.07, 1.15) in adulthood. There was evidence for accumulating effects across development, ranging from β = 0.15 (95%CI 0.11, 0.18) to β = 0.23 (95%CI 0.16, 0.29) depending on cohort. Our findings are consistent with the interpretation that parents pass on advantages to offspring not only via direct genetic transmission or purely environmental paths, but also via genetic associations with parental investment from conception to wealth inheritance.
AB - Genetic inheritance is not the only way parents’ genes may affect children. It is also possible that parents’ genes are associated with investments into children’s development. We examined evidence for links between parental genetics and parental investments, from the prenatal period through to adulthood, using data from six population-based cohorts in the UK, US and New Zealand, together totalling 36,566 parents. Our findings revealed associations between parental genetics—summarized in a genome-wide polygenic score—and parental behaviour across development, from smoking in pregnancy, breastfeeding in infancy, parenting in childhood and adolescence, to leaving a wealth inheritance to adult children. Effect sizes tended to be small at any given time point, ranging from RR = 1.12 (95% confidence interval (95%CI) 1.09, 1.15) to RR = 0.76 (95%CI 0.72, 0.80) during the prenatal period and infancy; β = 0.07 (95%CI 0.04, 0.11) to β = 0.29 (95%CI 0.27, 0.32) in childhood and adolescence, and RR = 1.04 (95%CI 1.01, 1.06) to RR = 1.11 (95%CI 1.07, 1.15) in adulthood. There was evidence for accumulating effects across development, ranging from β = 0.15 (95%CI 0.11, 0.18) to β = 0.23 (95%CI 0.16, 0.29) depending on cohort. Our findings are consistent with the interpretation that parents pass on advantages to offspring not only via direct genetic transmission or purely environmental paths, but also via genetic associations with parental investment from conception to wealth inheritance.
KW - behavioural genetics
KW - development studies
KW - human behaviour
U2 - 10.1038/s41562-023-01618-5
DO - 10.1038/s41562-023-01618-5
M3 - Article
SN - 2397-3374
JO - Nature Human Behaviour
JF - Nature Human Behaviour
ER -