The DOI matches its Crossref record; 33 of the 39 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Common DNA Markers Can Account for More Than Half of the Genetic Influence on Cognitive Abilities
Open accessAbstract
For nearly a century, twin and adoption studies have yielded substantial estimates of heritability for cognitive abilities, although it has proved difficult for genomewide-association studies to identify the genetic variants that account for this heritability (i.e., the missing-heritability problem). However, a new approach, genomewide complex-trait analysis (GCTA), forgoes the identification of individual variants to estimate the total heritability captured by common DNA markers on genotyping arrays. In the same sample of 3,154 pairs of 12-year-old twins, we directly compared twin-study heritability estimates for cognitive abilities (language, verbal, nonverbal, and general) with GCTA estimates captured by 1.7 million DNA markers. We found that DNA markers tagged by the array accounted for .66 of the estimated heritability, reaffirming that cognitive abilities are heritable. Larger sample sizes alone will be sufficient to identify many of the genetic variants that influence cognitive abilities.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The source backs part of the claim, not all of it — or backs it for a different population, condition or comparison.
In the citing paper
“findings generally supported by heritability estimates from genome-wide data on unrelated individuals (Davies et al., 2011; Plomin et al., 2013).”
From Large Cross-National Differences in Gene × Socioeconomic Status Interaction on Intelligence (2016) · cites this paper as Plomin et al., 2013
Experimental — accuracy not yet measured
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cites
GCTA: a tool for genome-wide complex trait analysis
Yang, J., Lee, S. H., Goddard, M. E., & Visscher, P. M. (2011) · The American Journal of Human Genetics · doi:10.1016/j.ajhg.2010.11.011 · Cited by 8,279
Common SNPs explain a large proportion of the heritability for human height
Yang, J., Benyamin, B., McEvoy, B. P., Gordon, S., Henders, A. K., Nyholt, D. R., Madden, P. A., Heath, A. C., Martin, N. G., Montgomery, G. W., et al. (2010) · Nature Genetics · doi:10.1038/ng.608 · Cited by 4,446 · cited 2×
“GCTA has been used to estimate heritability as captured by genotyping arrays for height (Yang et al., 2010), weight (Yang, Manolio, et al., 2011), psychiatric and other medical disorders (Lee et al., 2012; Lee et al., 2011; Lubke et al., 2012), and personality (Vinkhuyzen, Pedersen, et al., 2012).”
MethodHowie, B. N., Donnelly, P., & Marchini, J. (2009) · PLoS Genetics · doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1000529 · Cited by 3,928
Genome-wide association studies for complex traits: consensus, uncertainty and challenges
McCarthy, M. I., Abecasis, G. R., Cardon, L. R., Goldstein, D. B., Little, J., Ioannidis, J. P. A., & Hirschhorn, J. N. (2008) · Nature Reviews Genetics · doi:10.1038/nrg2344 · Cited by 2,891 · cited 2×
“GWA studies assess associations between a trait and hundreds of thousands of DNA markers (typically singlenucleotide polymorphisms, SNPs) distributed throughout the 3 billion nucleotide bases of the genome genotyped simultaneously using a DNA array the size of a postage stamp (McCarthy et al., 2008).”
MethodVisscher, P. M., Brown, M. A., McCarthy, M. I., & Yang, J. (2012) · The American Journal of Human Genetics · doi:10.1016/j.ajhg.2011.11.029 · Cited by 2,425
Hundreds of variants clustered in genomic loci and biological pathways affect human height
Lango Allen, H., Estrada, K., Lettre, G., Berndt, S. I., Weedon, M. N., Rivadeneira, F., Willer, C. J., Jackson, A. U., Vedantam, S., Raychaudhuri, S., et al. (2010) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature09410 · Cited by 1,945 · cited 1×
“This would mean that, with sample sizes in the hundreds of thousands, as in research on height (Lango Allen et al., 2010) and weight (Speliotes et al., 2010), many replicable associations between DNA and cognitive abilities could be found.”
BackgroundPersonal genomes: The case of the missing heritability
Maher, B. (2008) · Nature · doi:10.1038/456018a · Cited by 1,737 · cited 1×
“However, there is a great gap between genes identified so far in GWA studies and heritability estimates— the missing-heritability problem (Maher, 2008).”
BackgroundRare and common variants: twenty arguments
Gibson, G. (2012) · Nature Reviews Genetics · doi:10.1038/nrg3118 · Cited by 1,278 · cited 2×
“Accounting for the rest of the missing heritability is likely to require other DNA variants not well tagged by the common SNPs on current DNA arrays (Gibson, 2012).”
BackgroundUncovering the roles of rare variants in common disease through whole-genome sequencing
Cirulli, E. T., & Goldstein, D. B. (2010) · Nature Reviews Genetics · doi:10.1038/nrg2779 · Cited by 1,136 · cited 1×
“One of many possible reasons for the missing-heritability problem is that the common SNPs (i.e., SNPs for which the frequency of the less frequent allele is greater than .01) incorporated in commercially available DNA arrays miss the contribution of rare DNA variants (Cirulli & Goldstein, 2010).”
BackgroundEstimating Missing Heritability for Disease from Genome-wide Association Studies
Lee, S. H., Wray, N. R., Goddard, M. E., & Visscher, P. M. (2011) · The American Journal of Human Genetics · doi:10.1016/j.ajhg.2011.02.002 · Cited by 1,064 · cited 2×
“GCTA has been used to estimate heritability as captured by genotyping arrays for height (Yang et al., 2010), weight (Yang, Manolio, et al., 2011), psychiatric and other medical disorders (Lee et al., 2012; Lee et al., 2011; Lubke et al., 2012), and personality (Vinkhuyzen, Pedersen, et al., 2012).”
BackgroundMethod
Flagged first, then by citations
6 of the 39 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.
Research works printed but not linked: 4
- 10.1146/annurev-psych-120710-100353 · DOI · Paper page
- Kovas Y., 2007, Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 72, 1, 10.1111/j.1540-5834.2007.00439.x · DOI
- Plomin R., 2013, Behavioral genetics
- 10.1038/ng.686 · DOI · Paper page
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Genetics and intelligence differences: five special findings
Plomin, R., & Deary, I. J. (2015) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/mp.2014.105 · Cited by 702
Self-citationHaworth, C., Davis, O., & Plomin, R. (2012) · Twin Research and Human Genetics · doi:10.1017/thg.2012.91 · Cited by 467
Self-citationThe new genetics of intelligence
Plomin, R. J., & von Stumm, S. (2018) · Nature Reviews Genetics · doi:10.1038/nrg.2017.104 · Cited by 525
Self-citationLarge Cross-National Differences in Gene × Socioeconomic Status Interaction on Intelligence
Tucker-Drob, E. M., & Bates, T. C. (2016) · Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/0956797615612727 · Cited by 359
“…estimates from twin and pedigree studies of intelligence are large (Bouchard & McGue, 1981) and increase with age (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013), findings generally supported by heritability estimates from genome-wide data on unrelated individuals (Davies et al., 2011; Plomin et al., 2013).”
BackgroundManuck, S. B., & McCaffery, J. M. (2014) · Annual Review of Psychology · doi:10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115100 · Cited by 296
The road to precision psychiatry: translating genetics into disease mechanisms
Gandal, M. J., Leppa, V., Won, H., Parikshak, N. N., & Geschwind, D. H. (2016) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.4409 · Cited by 223
Lencz, T., Knowles, E., Davies, G., Guha, S., Liewald, D., Starr, J. M., Djurovic, S., Melle, I. S., Sundet, K. S., Christoforou, A., et al. (2013) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/mp.2013.166 · Cited by 205
DEMONSTRATING THE VALIDITY OF TWIN RESEARCH IN CRIMINOLOGY
BARNES, J. C., WRIGHT, J. P., BOUTWELL, B. B., SCHWARTZ, J. A., CONNOLLY, E. J., NEDELEC, J. L., & BEAVER, K. M. (2014) · Criminology · doi:10.1111/1745-9125.12049 · Cited by 192
Clarke, T.-K., Lupton, M. K., Fernandez-Pujals, A. M., Starr, J., Davies, G., Cox, S., Pattie, A., Liewald, D. C., Hall, L. S., MacIntyre, D. J., et al. (2016) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/mp.2015.12 · Cited by 179
Biospecimens and the ABCD study: Rationale, methods of collection, measurement and early data
Uban, K. A., Horton, M. K., Jacobus, J., Heyser, C., Thompson, W. K., Tapert, S. F., Madden, P. A. F., & Sowell, E. R. (2018) · Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience · doi:10.1016/j.dcn.2018.03.005 · Cited by 175
Genomic analysis of family data reveals additional genetic effects on intelligence and personality
Hill, W. D., Arslan, R. C., Xia, C., Luciano, M., Amador, C., Navarro, P., Hayward, C., Nagy, R., Porteous, D. J., McIntosh, A. M., et al. (2018) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/s41380-017-0005-1 · Cited by 158
“The additional variance explained by the GRMkin is unlikely to be due to common SNPs that are poorly tagged on current arrays because even with imputed data SNP heritability estimates of general intelligence are around 66% of that explained by twin models in the same sample.(59) Using GREML-LDMS,(60) and data on 43,59…”
MethodGenetic influence on family socioeconomic status and children's intelligence
Trzaskowski, M., Harlaar, N., Arden, R., Krapohl, E. M. L., Rimfeld, K., McMillan, A. J., Dale, P. S., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2013.11.002 · Cited by 160
Self-citationSystems genetics identifies a convergent gene network for cognition and neurodevelopmental disease
Johnson, M. R., Shkura, K., Langley, S. R., Delahaye‐Duriez, A., Srivastava, P. K., Hill, W. D., Rackham, O. J. L., Davies, G., Harris, S. E., Moreno‐Moral, A., et al. (2015) · Nature Neuroscience · doi:10.1038/nn.4205 · Cited by 140
No Genetic Influence for Childhood Behavior Problems From DNA Analysis
Trzaskowski, M., Dale, P. S., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry · doi:10.1016/j.jaac.2013.07.016 · Cited by 80
“These results are based on the same individuals and twin pairs used in the present analyses of behavior problems, although the results are highly similar to those previously published for the entire TEDS sample.(16) As expected from the literature, the twin study heritability estimates for height and weight are about…”
ResultSelf-citationTrzaskowski, M., Yang, J., Visscher, P. M., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/mp.2012.191 · Cited by 109
Self-citationShakeshaft, N. G., Trzaskowski, M., McMillan, A., Rimfeld, K., Krapohl, E., Haworth, C., Dale, P. S., & Plomin, R. (2013) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0080341 · Cited by 112
“The equal environments assumption has survived several tests of its validity, but the most persuasive evidence is that similar results are found using two other methods with different assumptions: the adoption method and a quantitative genetic method based on DNA alone [28][29].”
ResultSelf-citationSanchez‐Roige, S., Fontanillas, P., Elson, S. L., The 23andMe Research Team, Gray, J. C., de Wit, H., Davis, L. K., MacKillop, J., & Palmer, A. A. (2019) · Addiction Biology · doi:10.1111/adb.12574 · Cited by 101
“…lower than previous chip-heritability estimates based on dichotomized AUDIT data (30 ± 12%; Mbarek et al. 2015) and considerably lower than twin based heritabilities of alcohol abuse, dependence and alcoholism (~50%; Goldman, Oroszi & Ducci, 2005; Enoch 2013) as expected (e.g. Plomin et al., 2013).”
First Genome-Wide Association Study on Anxiety-Related Behaviours in Childhood
Trzaskowski, M., Eley, T. C., Davis, O. S. P., Doherty, S. J., Hanscombe, K. B., Meaburn, E. L., Haworth, C. M. A., Price, T. S., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0058676 · Cited by 75
Self-citationRitchie, S. J., Bates, T. C., & Plomin, R. (2015) · Child Development · doi:10.1111/cdev.12272 · Cited by 98
Self-citationSimonton, D. K. (2013) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2013.04.007 · Cited by 109
Blokland, G. A. M., Mesholam‐Gately, R. I., Toulopoulou, T., del Re, E. C., Lam, M., DeLisi, L. E., Donohoe, G. J., Walters, J., Seidman, L. J., & Petryshen, T. L. (2016) · Schizophrenia Bulletin · doi:10.1093/schbul/sbw146 · Cited by 93
Cognitive Capitalism: Human Capital and the Wellbeing of Nations
Rindermann, H. (2018) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781107279339 · Cited by 77
The genetic underpinnings of callous-unemotional traits: A systematic research review
Moore, A. A., Blair, J., Hettema, J. M., & Roberson‐Nay, R. (2019) · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews · doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2019.02.018 · Cited by 91
“Furthermore, even for anthropomorphic and cognitive traits, GCTAbased heritability estimates are about half of the twin-based estimates (Plomin et al., 2013).”
BackgroundA Statistical Approach for Testing Cross-Phenotype Effects of Rare Variants
Broadaway, K. A., Cutler, D. J., Duncan, R., Moore, J. L., Ware, E. B., Jhun, M. A., Bielak, L. F., Zhao, W., Smith, J. A., Peyser, P. A., et al. (2016) · The American Journal of Human Genetics · doi:10.1016/j.ajhg.2016.01.017 · Cited by 80
Genetics of Callous-Unemotional Behavior in Children
Viding, E. M., Price, T. S., Jaffee, S. R., Trzaskowski, M., Davis, O. S. P., Meaburn, E. L., Haworth, C. M. A., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0065789 · Cited by 85
Self-citationDNA Evidence for Strong Genome-Wide Pleiotropy of Cognitive and Learning Abilities
Trzaskowski, M., Davis, O., Defries, J., Yang, J., Visscher, P., & Plomin, R. (2013) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-013-9594-x · Cited by 72
“…Institute, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD 4072, Australia influence for height and body mass index (Yang et al. 2010, 2011b), psychiatric and medical disorders (Lee et al. 2011), personality (Vinkhuyzen et al. 2012), and cognitive abilities (Davies et al. 2011; Plomin et al. 2013b).”
BackgroundInfluentialSelf-citationBraudt, D. B. (2018) · Sociology Compass · doi:10.1111/soc4.12626 · Cited by 70
Smith‐Woolley, E., Pingault, J., Selzam, S., Rimfeld, K., Krapohl, E. M. L., von Stumm, S., Asbury, K., Dale, P. S., Young, T., Allen, R. S., et al. (2018) · npj Science of Learning · doi:10.1038/s41539-018-0019-8 · Cited by 78
Self-citationDediu, D., Janssen, R., & Moisik, S. R. (2016) · Language & Communication · doi:10.1016/j.langcom.2016.10.002 · Cited by 72
“However, those that do exist, coupled with insights from other cognitive domains such as intelligence (Plomin et al., 2013) and even “simple” but easily measurable phenotypes such as height (Visscher et al., 2010), suggest that at least some aspects of the variation between normal individuals in…”
BackgroundGenotype-Environment Correlation in the Era of DNA
Plomin, R. J. (2014) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-014-9673-7 · Cited by 65
“Comparisons between GCTA and twin study estimates of heritability generally show that GCTA accounts for about half the heritability estimates in twin studies (Plomin et al. 2013), perhaps less for behavior problems and personality (Trzaskowski et al. 2013a).”
BackgroundSelf-citationCommentary: Missing heritability, polygenic scores, and gene–environment correlation
Plomin, R. (2013) · Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines · doi:10.1111/jcpp.12128 · Cited by 60
Self-citationA Meta-analysis of Heritability of Cognitive Aging: Minding the “Missing Heritability” Gap
Reynolds, C. A., & Finkel, D. (2015) · Neuropsychology Review · doi:10.1007/s11065-015-9280-2 · Cited by 63
Belsky, J., Newman, D. A., Widaman, K. F., Rodkin, P., Pluess, M., Fraley, R. C., Berry, D. J., Helm, J. L., & Roisman, G. I. (2014) · Development and Psychopathology · doi:10.1017/s0954579414000844 · Cited by 58
APOE and BDNF Val66Met polymorphisms combine to influence episodic memory function in older adults
Ward, D. D., Summers, M. J., Saunders, N. L., Janssen, P., Stuart, K. E., & Vickers, J. C. (2014) · Behavioural Brain Research · doi:10.1016/j.bbr.2014.06.022 · Cited by 64
Why do we differ in number sense? Evidence from a genetically sensitive investigation
Tosto, M. G., Petrill, S., Halberda, J., Trzaskowski, M., Tikhomirova, T., Bogdanova, O., Ly, R., Wilmer, J., Naiman, D., Germine, L., et al. (2014) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2013.12.007 · Cited by 57
“Twins Early Development Study (TEDS) is a large longitudinal study of twins born in England and Wales in 1994, 1995 and 1996 (Haworth, Davis, & Plomin, 2013).”
BackgroundSelf-citationThe future of genomics for developmentalists
Plomin, R. J., & Simpson, M. A. (2013) · Development and Psychopathology · doi:10.1017/s0954579413000606 · Cited by 65
“…(Lee, DeCandia, et al., 2012; Lee, Wray, Goddard, & Visscher, 2011; Lubke et al., 2012), cognitive abilities (Benyamin et al., 2013; Davies et al., 2011; Deary et al., 2012; Plomin et al., 2013), personality (Vinkhuyzen et al., 2012), and economic and political preferences (Benjamin et al., 2012).”
BackgroundSelf-citationGenetic susceptibility to accelerated cognitive decline in the US Health and Retirement Study
Zhang, C., & Pierce, B. L. (2014) · Neurobiology of Aging · doi:10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2013.12.021 · Cited by 49
How Can We Study the Evolution of Animal Minds?
Cauchoix, M., & Chaine, A. S. (2016) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00358 · Cited by 51
Robinson, E., Kirby, A. W., Ruparel, K., Yang, J., McGrath, L. M., Anttila, V., Neale, B. M., Merikangas, K. R., Lehner, T., Abou‐Sleiman, P. M., et al. (2014) · Molecular Psychiatry · doi:10.1038/mp.2014.65 · Cited by 43
“Recent studies using population samples have estimated that common SNPs alone explain 22-46% of variance in intelligence in childhood and 40-51% of the same differences in adulthood (4-7).”
Schmidt, F. L. (2017) · Archives of Scientific Psychology · doi:10.1037/arc0000033 · Cited by 45
Genetic Basis of a Cognitive Complexity Metric
Hansell, N. K., Halford, G. S., Andrews, G., Shum, D., Harris, S. E., Davies, G., Franić, S., Christoforou, A., Zietsch, B. P., Painter, J. N., et al. (2015) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0123886 · Cited by 55
Genome‐wide mediation analysis of psychiatric and cognitive traits through imaging phenotypes
Bi, X., Yang, L., Li, T., Wang, B., Hongtu Zhu, B., & Zhang, H. (2017) · Human Brain Mapping · doi:10.1002/hbm.23650 · Cited by 41
“Imaging genetics, a transdisciplinary and thriving field which maps brain structures and functions to genetic variants [Bertram et al., 2007; Glahn et al., 2007; Potkin et al., 2009], has attracted a great deal of attention recently.”
BackgroundAlexander, D. (2017) · doi:10.1017/9781316493366 · Cited by 41
Gifted education: changing conceptions, emphases and practice
Matthews, D. J., & Dai, D. Y. (2014) · International Studies in Sociology of Education · doi:10.1080/09620214.2014.979578 · Cited by 47
“There is an emerging consensus that giftedness is the result of an interaction between genetic predispositions and environmental forces, and that it is not innate but rather develops (Haworth & Plomin, 2010; Horowitz, 2000, 2009; Plomin et al., 2013).”
BackgroundGhisletta, P., Bäckman, L., Bertram, L., Brandmaier, A. M., Gerstorf, D., Liu, T., & Lindenberger, U. (2014) · Psychology and Aging · doi:10.1037/a0035201 · Cited by 41
Genome-Wide Association Study of Receptive Language Ability of 12-Year-Olds
Harlaar, N., Meaburn, E. L., Hayiou‐Thomas, M. E., Davis, O. S. P., Docherty, S. J., Hanscombe, K. B., Haworth, C. M. A., Price, T. S., Trzaskowski, M., Dale, P. S., et al. (2014) · Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research · doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2013/12-0303 · Cited by 24
Self-citationCohort Effects in the Genetic Influence on Smoking
Domingue, B. W., Conley, D., Fletcher, J. M., & Boardman, J. D. (2015) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-015-9731-9 · Cited by 40
“This technique has been used to study higher-level traits such as cognitive abilities (Plomin et al. 2013), alcohol consumption (Vrieze et al. 2013), and self-reported health (Boardman et al. 2015).”
Embryo Selection for Cognitive Enhancement: Curiosity or Game‐changer?
Shulman, C., & Bostrom, N. (2014) · Global Policy · doi:10.1111/1758-5899.12123 · Cited by 96
“However, recent work using genome-wide complex trait analysis suggests that most of the ‘ missing heritability ’ for cognitive ability can be attributed to a large number of common variants with individually tiny effect sizes (Davies et al., 2011; Benyam-in et al., 2013; Plomin et al., 2013).”
Intelligence indexes generalist genes for cognitive abilities
Trzaskowski, M., Shakeshaft, N. G., & Plomin, R. J. (2013) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2013.07.011 · Cited by 23
Self-citationCognitive intermediate phenotype and genetic risk for psychosis
Mark, W., & Toulopoulou, T. (2015) · Current Opinion in Neurobiology · doi:10.1016/j.conb.2015.08.008 · Cited by 33
Genetics and Organizational Behavior
Arvey, R. D., Li, W., & Wang, N. (2016) · Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior · doi:10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-032414-111251 · Cited by 32
Li, W., Wang, N., Arvey, R. D., Soong, R. C. T., Saw, S., & Song, Z. (2015) · The Leadership Quarterly · doi:10.1016/j.leaqua.2014.12.005 · Cited by 35
Predicting Cognitive Executive Functioning with Polygenic Risk Scores for Psychiatric Disorders
Benca, C. E., Derringer, J. L., Corley, R. P., Young, S. E., Keller, M. C., Hewitt, J. K., & Friedman, N. P. (2017) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-016-9814-2 · Cited by 26
“…et al. 2014), and at best only a handful of SNPs have been identified for constructs related to EFs (Davis et al. 2010; Ibrahim-Verbaas et al. 2016; Plomin et al. 2013; Rietveld et al. 2014), it is difficult to assess whether the same genetic variants that predict EFs also predict these…”
BackgroundEvolutionary behavioral genetics
Zietsch, B. P., de Candia, T. R., & Keller, M. C. (2014) · Current Opinion in Behavioral Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.cobeha.2014.09.005 · Cited by 33
Insights into the Genetic Foundations of Human Communication
Graham, S. A., Deriziotis, P., & Fisher, S. E. (2015) · Neuropsychology Review · doi:10.1007/s11065-014-9277-2 · Cited by 28
The Role and Sources of Individual Differences in Critical-Analytic Thinking: a Capsule Overview
Bolger, D. J., Mackey, A. P., Wang, M., & Grigorenko, E. L. (2014) · Educational Psychology Review · doi:10.1007/s10648-014-9279-x · Cited by 30
“…knowledge, with the latter being more heritable than the former (Kan et al. 2013), the field has converged, after a number of meta-analyses, on the estimate of 0.5 for general cognitive ability, which is a higherorder index derived from both fluid and crystallized capacities (Plomin et al. 2013a).”
BackgroundInfluentialFerrara, M., Mehta, A., Qureshi, H., Avery, P., Yorston, D., Laidlaw, D., Williamson, T. H., & Steel, D. H. (2020) · American journal of ophthalmology-glaucoma · doi:10.1016/j.ajo.2020.09.036 · Cited by 25
Why genome-wide associations with cognitive ability measures are probably spurious
Richardson, K., & Jones, M. C. (2019) · New Ideas in Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.newideapsych.2019.04.005 · Cited by 28
Pourcain, B. S., Haworth, C., Davis, O., Wang, K., Timpson, N., Evans, D. M., Kemp, J., Ronald, A., Price, T., Meaburn, E., et al. (2014) · Human Genetics · doi:10.1007/s00439-014-1514-5 · Cited by 25
“Alternatively, peer problems may depend on pubertal timing and relate to disparities between chronological age, social age and biological maturation (e.g. “early 1 3 maturation” hypothesis (Peterson and Taylor 1980)).”
BackgroundSelf-citationA behavior genetic analysis of the tendency for youth to associate according to GPA
Barnes, J. C., Beaver, K. M., Young, J. T. N., & TenEyck, M. F. (2014) · Social Networks · doi:10.1016/j.socnet.2014.01.001 · Cited by 22
“This was an expected finding given the large literature reporting a genetic influence on cognitive ability (e.g., Plomin et al., 2013).”
BackgroundGenetic architecture of cognitive traits
Hellard, S. L., & Steen, V. M. (2014) · Scandinavian Journal of Psychology · doi:10.1111/sjop.12112 · Cited by 21
“The heritability of speci fi c domains such as memory is around 0.4 for verbal cognitive ability and 0.39 for language ability (Plomin, Haworth, Meaburn, Price & Davis, 2013).”
InfluentialFaul, J., Mitchell, C. M., Smith, J. A., & Zhao, W. (2016) · Biodemography and Social Biology · doi:10.1080/19485565.2015.1120645 · Cited by 20
“For example, twin studies will include the effects of gene-by-gene interactions (G × G; epistasis), as identical twins share virtually 100 percent of their DNA sequence and thus share all genetic effects, whether additive or nonadditive (Plomin et al. 2013).”
Arslan, R. C., Penke, L., Johnson, W., Iacono, W. G., & McGue, M. K. (2014) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0090097 · Cited by 20
Thomas, M. S. C., Forrester, N. A., & Ronald, A. (2015) · Cognitive Science · doi:10.1111/cogs.12230 · Cited by 20
“Using this approach, Benyamin, Pourcain, Davis, Davies, and Visscher (2013) found that the similarity between SNPs could explain between 22% and 46% of phenotypic variation in childhood intelligence in three large cohorts totaling 18,000 individuals aged between 6 and 18 (see also Plomin, Haworth, Meaburn, Price, & Da…”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialShame and Guilt-Proneness in Adolescents: Gene-Environment Interactions
Szentágotai-Tătar, A., Chiş, A., Vulturar, R., Dobrean, A., Nechita, D., & Miu, A. C. (2015) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0134716 · Cited by 18
Harlaar, N., Trzaskowski, M., Dale, P. S., & Plomin, R. J. (2014) · Child Development · doi:10.1111/cdev.12207 · Cited by 19
Self-citationPower, R., Nagoshi, C., Defries, J., & Plomin, R. (2013) · European Journal of Human Genetics · doi:10.1038/ejhg.2013.155 · Cited by 18
Self-citationModelling human hard palate shape with Bézier curves
Janssen, R., Moisik, S. R., & Dediu, D. (2018) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0191557 · Cited by 15
Maksimov, M., Vaht, M., Murd, C., Harro, J., & Bachmann, T. (2015) · Neuropsychologia · doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2015.03.022 · Cited by 17
“Differences in brain function also include varieties of pathology, which in turn can be nonrandomly distributed between different genotypes (Bouchard and Loehlin, 2001; Plomin et al., 2013).”
BackgroundDNA Dreams': Teacher Perspectives on the Role and Relevance of Genetics for Education
Martschenko, D. O. (2019) · Research in Education · doi:10.1177/0034523719869956 · Cited by 23
“Researchers say that this phenomenon is due to the polygenic nature of the behaviour (Plomin et al., 2013); in other words, intelligence is influenced by many genes, each with a small effect size.”
BackgroundPsychometric Studies of Scientific Talent and Eminence
Feist, G. J. (2014) · doi:10.1002/9781118367377.ch4 · Cited by 14
A statistical genetic investigation of psychiatric resilience
Cusack, S. E., Alıev, F., Bustamante, D., Spit for Science Working Group, Dick, D. M., & Amstadter, A. B. (2023) · European Journal of Psychotraumatology · doi:10.1080/20008066.2023.2178762 · Cited by 12
Nivison, M. D., Fearon, P., Jenkins, J. M., & Madigan, S. (2026) · Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines · doi:10.1111/jcpp.70087 · Cited by 12
“Although language and cognitive ability are highly heritable (Plomin et al., 2013; Plomin & Spinath, 2002), Roisman and Fraley (2012) found that in behavior-genetic models, the phenotypic correlation between sensitivity and academic skills was largely attributable to environmental (shared and…”
Realo, A., van der Most, P. J., Allïk, J., Esko, T., Jeronimus, B. F., Kööts‐Ausmees, L., Mõttus, R., Tropf, F. C., Snieder, H., & Ormel, J. (2016) · Journal of Personality · doi:10.1111/jopy.12297 · Cited by 16
Johnson, W., & Bouchard, T. J. (2014) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781118367377.ch14 · Cited by 10
“While molecular methods confirm that cognitive abilities are strongly under the influence of genes (Plomin et al., 2013), despite considerable effort, often in the form of very large genome-wide association consortium studies, we currently know of no genetic variants reliably associated with…”
BackgroundCognitive Traits as Sexually Selected Fitness Indicators
Klasios, J. (2013) · Review of General Psychology · doi:10.1037/a0034391 · Cited by 9
“…de Geus, & Deary, 2009; Segal & Johnson, 2009)—with molecular-genetic studies also confirming its heritable basis (e.g., Davies et al., 2011; Plomin et al., 2013)—it would certainly accord with Miller’s overall thesis insofar as it, too, is a latent variable that correlates with the…”
BackgroundGenome-Wide Estimates of Heritability for Social Demographic Outcomes
Domingue, B. W., Wedow, R., Conley, D., McQueen, M. B., Hoffmann, T. J., & Boardman, J. D. (2016) · Biodemography and Social Biology · doi:10.1080/19485565.2015.1068106 · Cited by 10
Franić, S., Dolan, C. V., Broxholme, J., Hu, H., Żemojtel, T., Davies, G. E., Nelson, K. A., Ehli, E. A., Pool, R., Hottenga, J., et al. (2014) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2014.12.001 · Cited by 8
Alexander, D. R. (2020) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781108566520.005
Discovering the shared biology of cognitive traits determined by genetic overlap
Guimaraes, J., Bralten, J., Greven, C., Franke, B., Sprooten, E., & Beckmann, C. (2019) · bioRxiv · doi:10.1101/723643 · Cited by 7
A Common Polymorphism in SCN2A Predicts General Cognitive Ability through Effects on PFC Physiology
Scult, M. A., Trampush, J. W., Zheng, F., Drabant, E. M., Lencz, T., Malhotra, A. K., Dickinson, D., Weinberger, D. R., & Hariri, A. R. (2015) · Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience · doi:10.1162/jocn_a_00826 · Cited by 7
Correction: First Genome-Wide Association Study on Anxiety-Related Behaviours in Childhood
Trzaskowski, M., Eley, T., Davis, O., Doherty, S. J., Hanscombe, K. B., Meaburn, E., Haworth, C., Price, T. S., & Plomin, R. (2013) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/annotation/d320e3eb-ab8f-43ce-b341-3da36cd7ff99 · Cited by 7
Self-citationGenetics of Brain Aging – Twin Aging
Reynolds, C. A., & Phillips, D. (2014) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-801238-3.04608-0 · Cited by 7
Paternity analysis reveals sexual selection on cognitive performance in mosquitofish
Vinogradov, I., Fox, R. J., Fichtel, C., Kappeler, P., & Jennions, M. (2025) · Nature Ecology & Evolution · doi:10.1038/s41559-025-02645-3 · Cited by 6
“We assigned boldness to each male as the mean time to emerge from the start zone in trials 1–8 in the inhibitory control assay.”
Fine mapping genetic associations between the HLA region and extremely high intelligence
Zabaneh, D., Krapohl, E. M. L., Simpson, M. A., Miller, M. B., Iacono, W. G., McGue, M. K., Putallaz, M., Lubinski, D., Plomin, R. J., & Breen, G. D. (2017) · Scientific Reports · doi:10.1038/srep41182 · Cited by 6
Self-citationParents’ Wisdom and Adolescents’ Cognitive, Social, and Emotional Developmental Qualities
Mazloom, M. Z., Ardelt, M., Asadi, S., & Dehghani, F. (2023) · Journal of Family Issues · doi:10.1177/0192513x231155650 · Cited by 5
“Other factors than parental wisdom, such as heritability (Allegrini et al., 2019; Plomin, Fulker, Corley, & DeFries, 1997; Plomin et al., 2013), parental socioeconomic status (Cave et al., 2022; Demetriou et al., 2020; Madhushanthi et al., 2020; O ’ Connell & Marks, 2021; Rindermann & Ceci, 2018;…”
BackgroundSilva, P. R., Marinho, V., Magalhães, F., Farias, T., Gupta, D., Barbosa, A. L. R., Velasques, B., Ribeiro, P., Cagy, M., Bastos, V., et al. (2022) · Consciousness and Cognition · doi:10.1016/j.concog.2022.103317 · Cited by 5
Talent as an unintentional agent
Papageorgiou, K. (2015) · Bioethica · doi:10.12681/bioeth.19651 · Cited by 4
The Neurobiological Strands of Developmental Dyslexia: What We Know and What We Don’t Know
Sand, L. A., & Bolger, D. J. (2019) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-030-26550-2_10 · Cited by 7
Lin, Y., Procopio, F., Keser, E., Kawakami, K., Rimfeld, K., Malanchini, M., & Plomin, R. J. (2025) · Intelligence & Cognitive Abilities · doi:10.65550/001c.140654 · Cited by 3
Self-citationCognition and Its Shaping Effect on Sexual Conflict: Integrating Biology and Psychology
Álvarez, B., & Koene, J. M. (2022) · Frontiers in Integrative Neuroscience · doi:10.3389/fnint.2022.826304 · Cited by 2
Atypical Cognitive Development
Pennington, B. F. (2015) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781118963418.childpsy223 · Cited by 2
Blurred Lines: A Study of Engagement in Online Learning
Chametzky, B. (2015) · Journal of Education Society and Behavioural Science · doi:10.9734/bjesbs/2015/16876 · Cited by 3
Carvalho, C., & Ravindran, N. (2025) · Journal of Research on Adolescence · doi:10.1111/jora.70125 · Cited by 3
“Although cognitive abilities are highly heritable in general across the lifespan (Plomin et al., 2013), they are also subject to environmental influences (Nisbett et al., 2012).”
Dong, L., Giangrande, E. J., Womack, S. R., Yoo, K., Beam, C. R., Jacobson, K. C., & Turkheimer, E. N. (2023) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-023-10145-y · Cited by 3
The Trilogy of GxE : Conceptualization, Operationalization, and Application
Grigorenko, E. L., Bick, J. R., Campbell, D. J., Lewine, G., Abrams, J., Nguyen, V. T., & Chang, J. T. (2016) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781119125556.devpsy208 · Cited by 2
“…and all subsequent ones (until recently, when the data-analytic approach changed and genomewide complex-trait analysis, GCTA, was introduced, e.g., Plomin et al., 2013), reportedly accounted for only a small proportion of the previously published heritability estimates of diseases/disorders and…”
BackgroundBiosocial theories: Behavioral genetics and sociobiology
Newman, B. M., & Newman, P. R. (2020) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-815450-2.00003-6 · Cited by 1
Kaplan, J. M. (2014) · Biology & Philosophy · doi:10.1007/s10539-014-9428-0 · Cited by 25
The genetics of specific cognitive abilities
Procopio, F., Zhou, Q., Wang, Z.-Y., Gidziela, A., Rimfeld, K., Malanchini, M., & Plomin, R. (2022) · bioRxiv · doi:10.1101/2022.02.05.479237 · Cited by 1
Self-citationGenetic Information and How It Flows
Alexander, D. R. (2020) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781108566520.003 · Cited by 1
Metadata
- Authors
- Plomin, R., Haworth, C. M. A., Meaburn, E. L., Price, T. S., Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium 2, & Davis, O. S. P.
- Affiliations
- King's College London (GB)
- University of London (GB)
- Pennsylvania State University (US)
- University of Bristol (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Plomin, Robert
- Venue
- Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2013-03-15
- Volume
- 24
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 562-568
- ISSN
- 0956-7976 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-9280
- PMC
- PMC3652710
- OpenAlex
- W2098272018
- Cited by
- 138
- References
- 39
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 1 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 1 · 2020: 20 · 2019: 6 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 5 · 2016: 15 · 2015: 19 · 2014: 27 · 2013: 19
- FWCI
- 17.69
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Psychological Science (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- BIROn (Birkbeck, University of London) (acceptedVersion)
- Warwick Research Archive Portal (University of Warwick) (acceptedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- Research Portal (King's College London) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Bristol Research (University of Bristol) (submittedVersion)
- Explore Bristol Research (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Wellcome Trust (085475/Z/08/Z, WT088984, 085475/B/08/Z)
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (HD044454, R01HD046167, HD046167, R01HD044454)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic Associations and Epidemiology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic Mapping and Diversity in Plants and Animals
- Keywords
- cognitive ability, heritability, missing heritability, twin studies, language skills, verbal ability, nonverbal ability, genetic variants, genotyping arrays
- MeSH terms
- Child, Cognition, Genetic Markers, Genotype, Humans, Intelligence, Phenotype, Twins, Dizygotic, Twins, Monozygotic, Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide, Genome-Wide Association Study
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
