Explaining the Increasing Heritability of Cognitive Ability Across Development: A Meta-Analysis of Longitudinal Twin and Adoption Studies
Open accessAbstract
Genes account for increasing proportions of variation in cognitive ability across development, but the mechanisms underlying these increases remain unclear. We conducted a meta-analysis of longitudinal behavioral genetic studies spanning infancy to adolescence. We identified relevant data from 16 articles with 11 unique samples containing a total of 11,500 twin and sibling pairs who were all reared together and measured at least twice between the ages of 6 months and 18 years. Longitudinal behavioral genetic models were used to estimate the extent to which early genetic influences on cognition were amplified over time and the extent to which innovative genetic influences arose with time. Results indicated that in early childhood, innovative genetic influences predominate but that innovation quickly diminishes, and amplified influences account for increasing heritability following age 8 years.
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As heritability rises, the shared environmental component of traits like intelligence tends to become insignificant.
“As heritability rises, the shared environmental component of traits like intelligence tends to become insignificant [30,31].”
From Global Ancestry and Cognitive Ability (2019) · cites this paper as [31]
The Results section (‘Changes in genetic and environmental factors’; page unavailable) reports that longer intervals were associated with both increasing heritability and decreasing shared environmentality for cognitive ability. It does not establish that the shared environmental component becomes insignificant, or that the finding applies to traits beyond cognitive ability. (LLM, conf=0.85)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe well-established phenomenon of increasing genetic influences and decreasing shared environmental influences on intelligence with childhood age was replicated in the current meta-analytic dataset.
“We also replicated the well-established phenomenon of increasing genetic influences, and decreasing shared environmental influences, on intelligence with childhood age (e.g. Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013; Haworth et al., 2009) in the current meta-analytic dataset.”
From Large Cross-National Differences in Gene × Socioeconomic Status Interaction on Intelligence (2016) · cites this paper as Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013
Heritability estimates from twin and pedigree studies of intelligence increase with age.
“and increase with age (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013)”
From Large Cross-National Differences in Gene × Socioeconomic Status Interaction on Intelligence (2016) · cites this paper as Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013
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Li, W.-D., Stanek, K., Zhang, Z., Ones, D., & McGue, M. (2016) · Journal of Applied Psychology · doi:10.1037/apl0000057 · Cited by 27 · see citing works
The biological basis of intelligence: Benchmark findings
Hilger, K., Spinath, F., Troche, S., & Schubert, A.-L. (2022) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2022.101665 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
Patterson, M., Mann, F. D., Grotzinger, A., Tackett, J. L., Tucker-Drob, E., & Harden, K. (2018) · Developmental Psychology · doi:10.1037/dev0000578 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
“…to influence internalizing symptoms in postpubertal adolescents, but with larger effects, and/or (b) genetic innovation, in which new genetic variants not previously relevant to internalizing symptoms are “turned on” by the biological or social changes of puberty (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013).”
BackgroundSelf-citationVerhoef, E., Shapland, C. Y., Fisher, S., Dale, P. S., & Pourcain, B. S. (2020) · Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines · doi:10.1111/jcpp.13327 · Cited by 24 · see citing works
“From eight years of age onwards (mid-childhood), there was evidence for enhanced genetic stability with dominance of amplification processes (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013).”
BackgroundInfluentialReflections about intelligence over 40 years
Flynn, J. R. (2018) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2018.06.007 · Cited by 47 · see citing works
Protzko, J. (2017) · Developmental Review · doi:10.1016/j.dr.2017.05.001 · Cited by 43 · see citing works
Genetic architecture of cognitive traits
Hellard, S. L., & Steen, V. M. (2014) · Scandinavian Journal of Psychology · doi:10.1111/sjop.12112 · Cited by 21 · see citing works
“These twin studies have estimated that the heritability of the g factor is around 0.5 – 0.6, and it increases with age (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013; Deary, Johnson & Houlihan, 2009; Haworth, Wright, Luciano et al ., 2010).”
InfluentialCelebrating a Century of Research in Behavioral Genetics
Plomin, R. (2023) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-023-10132-3 · Cited by 20 · see citing works
“Evidence that shared environmental influence declines after adolescence to negligible levels for cognitive abilities has also emerged from twin studies (Briley and Tucker-Drob 2013; Haworth et al. 2010).”
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Etiology of basic psychological needs and their association with personality: A twin study
Bratko, D., Butković, A., Hlupić, T. V., & Pocrnić, M. (2022) · Journal of Research in Personality · doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2022.104201 · Cited by 22 · see citing works
Accessing the development and heritability of the capacity of cognitive control
Chen, Y., Chen, C., Wu, T., Qiu, B., Zhang, W., & Fan, J. (2020) · Neuropsychologia · doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2020.107361 · Cited by 21 · see citing works
Pahlen, S., Hamdi, N. R., Aslan, A. K. D., Horwitz, B. N., Panizzon, M. S., Petersen, I., Zavala, C., Christensen, K., Finkel, D., Franz, C. E., et al. (2018) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2017.12.004 · Cited by 19 · see citing works
“This active matching of environment to genotype would result in amplification of genetic variance and consequent increases in genetic variance (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013).”
Estimating the heritability of psychological measures in the Human Connectome Project dataset
Han, Y., & Adolphs, R. (2019) · bioRxiv · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0235860 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
A Call for Considering Color Vision Deficiency When Creating Graphics for Psychology Reports
Frane, A. V. (2015) · The Journal of general psychology · doi:10.1080/00221309.2015.1063475 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
“Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013 29.”
Heritability and genome-wide associations studies of cerebral blood flow in the general population
Ikram, M., Zonneveld, H. I., Roshchupkin, G., Smith, A., Franco, O., Sigurdsson, S., van Duijn, C. M., Uitterlinden, A., Launer, L., Vernooij, M., et al. (2017) · Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism · doi:10.1177/0271678x17715861 · Cited by 14 · see citing works
Review: changing (shared) heritability of ASD and ADHD across the lifespan
Rommelse, N., & Hartman, C. (2016) · European Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · doi:10.1007/s00787-016-0830-9 · Cited by 14 · see citing works
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Rimfeld, K., Malanchini, M., Arathimos, R., Gidziela, A., Pain, O., McMillan, A., Ogden, R., Webster, L., Packer, A. E., Shakeshaft, N. G., et al. (2021) · BJPsych Open · doi:10.1192/bjo.2022.506 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
Longitudinal genetic studies of cognitive characteristics
Mustafin, R., Kazantseva, A., Enikeeva, R., Malykh, S., & Khusnutdinova, E. (2020) · Vavilovskii zhurnal genetiki i selektsii · doi:10.18699/vj20.599 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
Nilsson, K. K., Landorph, S., Houmann, T., Olsen, E., & Skovgaard, A. M. (2019) · Infant Behavior and Development · doi:10.1016/j.infbeh.2019.04.001 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
Genetic and Environmental Influences on Achievement Goal Orientations Shift with Age
Zheng, A.-Q., Briley, D., Malanchini, M., Tackett, J. L., Harden, K., Tucker-Drob, E., & Wrzus, C. (2019) · European Journal of Personality · doi:10.1002/per.2202 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
“Many phenotypes do show signs of shifting heritability with age (Bergen, Gardner, & Kendler, 2007; Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013; Kandler & Papendick, 2017), and these changes tend to be most pronounced during periods of developmental change that co-occur with educational transitions.”
BackgroundSelf-citationModerating the Covariance Between Family Member’s Substance Use Behavior
Verhulst, B., Eaves, L., & Neale, M. (2014) · Behavior Genetics · doi:10.1007/s10519-014-9650-1 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
“There is ample evidence of age-specific genetic factors from longitudinal twin studies of many traits (the literature here is vast, but see van Beijsterveldt et al. 2013; Boomsma et al. 2002; Briley and Tucker-Drob 2013; Conley et al. 2013; Hewitt et al. 1988; Laceulle et al. 2013; Martino et al. 2013; Nance et al. 19…”
Gustavson, D., Borriello, G. A., Karhadkar, M. A., Rhee, S., Corley, R. P., Rhea, S., DiLalla, L. F., Wadsworth, S. J., Friedman, N. P., & Reynolds, C. A. (2025) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · doi:10.1073/pnas.2426531122 · Cited by 11 · see citing works
Cognitive Genomics: Recent Advances and Current Challenges
Fitzgerald, J. C., Morris, D. W., & Donohoe, G. J. (2020) · Current Psychiatry Reports · doi:10.1007/s11920-019-1125-x · Cited by 11 · see citing works
Raffington, L., Prindle, J., & Shing, Y. L. (2018) · Developmental Psychology · doi:10.1037/dev0000529 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
Educational tracking and the polygenic prediction of education
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Halpern-Manners, A., Marahrens, H., Neiderhiser, J. M., Natsuaki, M. N., Shaw, D. S., Reiss, D., & Leve, L. D. (2020) · Research in Social Stratification and Mobility · doi:10.1016/j.rssm.2020.100486 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Exploring the Genetic Etiology of Trust in Adolescents: Combined Twin and DNA Analyses
Wootton, R. E., Davis, O. S. P., Mottershaw, A. L., Wang, A., & Haworth, C. M. A. (2016) · Twin Research and Human Genetics · doi:10.1017/thg.2016.84 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
“…and environmental influences do vary with age (Haworth & Davis, 2014); for example, heritability of intelligence and body mass index (BMI) increase (Haworth et al., 2008; Haworth et al., 2010) due to geneenvironment correlations and our freedom to choose environments (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013).”
Kandler, C., Zapko-Willmes, A., Richter, J., & Riemann, R. (2021) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-813995-0.00007-8 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
Personality Differences and Development: Genetic and Environmental Contributions
Kandler, C., & Bleidorn, W. (2015) · Elsevier eBooks · doi:10.1016/b978-0-08-097086-8.25011-3 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
Sand, H., Sticca, F., Wehrle, F., Eichelberger, D., Simoni, H., Jenni, O., & Lannen, P. (2024) · International Journal of Child Abuse & Neglect · doi:10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106917 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
The genetics of gaming: A longitudinal twin study
Nilsson, A., Kuja-Halkola, R., Lichtenstein, P., Larsson, H., Lundström, S., Fatouros-Bergman, H., Jayaram-Lindström, N., & Molero, Y. (2023) · JCPP Advances · doi:10.1002/jcv2.12179 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Chasing Environmental Influences on School Grades in Childhood and Adolescence
Starr, A., & Riemann, R. (2022) · Contemporary Educational Psychology · doi:10.1016/j.cedpsych.2022.102043 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Austerberry, C., Fearon, P., Ronald, A., Leve, L., Ganiban, J., Natsuaki, M. N., Shaw, D., Neiderhiser, J., & Reiss, D. (2021) · Child Development · doi:10.1111/cdev.13706 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
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Teachers' behaviour and children's academic achievement: Evidence of gene-environment interactions.
Guimond, F.-A., Brendgen, M., Vitaro, F., Dionne, G., & Boivin, M. (2022) · British Journal of Educational Psychology · doi:10.1111/bjep.12546 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
Investigating the Mechanisms of G × SES Interactions for Education
Ruks, M. (2022) · Research in Social Stratification and Mobility · doi:10.1016/j.rssm.2022.100730 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
The winding roads to adulthood: A twin study
Rimfeld, K., Malanchini, M., Packer, A. E., Gidziela, A., Allegrini, A., Ayorech, Z., Smith-Woolley, E., McMillan, A., Ogden, R., Dale, P. S., et al. (2021) · bioRxiv · doi:10.1002/jcv2.12053 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
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Starr, A., Ruks, M., Weigel, L., & Riemann, R. (2023) · Learning and Individual Differences · doi:10.1016/j.lindif.2023.102287 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Wolfram, T., Ruks, M., & Spinath, F. M. (2024) · Research in Social Stratification and Mobility · doi:10.1016/j.rssm.2024.100980 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
Starr, A., & Riemann, R. (2022) · Intelligence · doi:10.1016/j.intell.2022.101664 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
Behavioral–genetic associations in the Human Connectome Project
Christova, P., Joseph, J., & Georgopoulos, A. (2020) · Experimental Brain Research · doi:10.1007/s00221-020-05893-w · Cited by 6 · see citing works
Hasan, A., & Afzal, M. (2019) · Multiple Sclerosis and Related Disorders · doi:10.1016/j.msard.2019.05.005 · Cited by 6 · see citing works
Genetic Mechanisms of Cognitive Development
Mustafin, R., Kazantseva, A., Malykh, S., & Khusnutdinova, E. (2020) · Russian Journal of Genetics · doi:10.1134/s102279542007011x · Cited by 5 · see citing works
How nonshared environmental factors come to correlate with heredity
Beam, C. R., Pezzoli, P., Mendle, J., Burt, S. A., Neale, M. C., Boker, S. M., Keel, P. K., & Klump, K. L. (2020) · Development and Psychopathology · doi:10.1017/s0954579420001017 · Cited by 4 · see citing works
“Meta-analyses of longitudinal findings have drawn on Dickens and Flynn’s version of the REM to understand age trends in genetic and environmental variance components, but only indirectly (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013, 2014; Tucker-Drob & Briley, 2014).”
BackgroundMaternal Life Satisfaction and Child Development from Toddlerhood to Adolescence
Gupta, N. D., Jessen, J., & Spieß, C. K. (2026) · Social Science Research Network · doi:10.2139/ssrn.4456340 · Cited by 4
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A Century of Behavioral Genetics at the University of Minnesota
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“(p. 264) Regardless of whether Scarr and Weinberg were correct about the mechanism behind the declining variance due to shared environment, the fact of the decline has since been borne out in numerous studies (Briley & Tucker-Drob, 2013).”
Altschul, D. (2019) · Socius Sociological Research for a Dynamic World · doi:10.1177/2378023118819943 · Cited by 4 · see citing works
“Cognitive ability is highly heritable (Bartels et al. 2002; Briley and Tucker-Drob 2013), and social circum-stances are usually also passed on from parents to children through their shared environments: the home, the neighborhood, and the larger community (Attree 2004, Deary et al. 2005).”
BackgroundIntelligence, Genetics of: Cognitive Abilities
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“%) variants: PTVs alone, damaging missense alone, and PTV+damaging missense combined (see Methods; Supplementary Table 11).”
Influential
- Authors
- Briley, D. A., & Tucker-Drob, E. M.
- Affiliations
- The University of Texas at Austin (US)
- Department of Psychology and Population Research Center, University of Texas at Austin
- Corresponding author
- Briley, Daniel A.
- ORCID
- Briley, Daniel A.
- Venue
- Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2013-07-01
- Volume
- 24
- Issue
- 9
- Pages
- 1704-1713
- ISSN
- 0956-7976 (ISSN-L)
- 1467-9280
- PMC
- PMC3954471
- OpenAlex
- W2116895257
- Cited by
- 178
- References
- 30
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 14 · 2022: 19 · 2021: 16 · 2020: 15 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 15 · 2017: 13 · 2016: 13 · 2015: 13 · 2014: 12 · 2013: 3
- FWCI
- 18.48
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Update notices
- correction (2021-02-16)
- Open access
- green
- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Locations
- Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- OSF Preprints (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R24HD042849, R21HD069772, T32HD007081)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Cognitive Abilities and Testing
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Genetics › Genetic Associations and Epidemiology
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Intergenerational and Educational Inequality Studies
- Keywords
- cognitive ability, heritability, gene-environment interaction
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adolescent Behavior, Adoption, Age Factors, Child, Child Behavior, Child Development, Child, Preschool, Cognition, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Humans, Infant, Longitudinal Studies, Male, Twins, Siblings
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