Genes influence academic ability across all subjects

Tuesday, August 4th, 2015

A recent study finds that genes influence academic ability across all subjects — and The Guardian is willing to report this:

The researchers analysed genetic data and GCSE scores from 12,500 twins, about half of whom were identical.

Results in all subjects, including maths, science, art and humanities, were highly heritable, with genes explaining a bigger proportion of the differences between children (54-65%) than environmental factors, such as school and family combined (14-21%), which were shared by the twins.

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When the scientists factored in IQ scores, they found that intelligence appeared to account for slightly less than half of the genetic component, suggesting that other heritable traits — curiosity, determination and memory, perhaps — play a significant role.

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Plomin said that while talking about genetics and education was no longer the taboo that it was twenty years ago, education professionals were slow to adapt teaching methods in the face of new scientific findings. “It’s a problem with evidence,” he said. “Thirty years ago medicine wasn’t particularly evidence-based. I think education is fundamentally not based on evidence. What programme has been rolled out that has been based on evidence? We ought to hold educationalists to the same standards of evidence as medicine.”

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