Genetically Informed Studies of Family Life: Effects on Adults and children

家庭生活的遗传学研究：对成人和儿童的影响

基本信息

批准号：
7482205
负责人：
ROBERT E EMERY
金额：
$ 25.62万
依托单位：
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
依托单位国家：
美国
项目类别：
财政年份：
2007
资助国家：
美国
起止时间：
2007-08-15 至 2010-07-31
项目状态：
已结题

项目摘要

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Extensive research documents that family experience, particularly family structure, is a risk (or protective) factor for a range of adverse physical and mental health outcomes in children and parents. However, the extent to which - or whether - family life causes unwanted outcomes is open to question. Neither parents nor children experience family life at random; rather, individuals are "selected" into family experiences based on known (and unknown) characteristics. Selection into the major family experiences that are our focus - teen pregnancy, divorce, stable marriage, and religious participation - is known to occur at the demographic level. Selection also is likely to occur based on unmeasured background experiences and individual characteristics, including genetically mediated selection effects such personality (e.g., antisocial behavior) or physical characteristics (e.g., age at first menarche). Behavior genetic researchers call this the gene- environment correlation, and suggest that the confound renders existing social science research on family life uninterpretable. We take this concern seriously, and have conducted genetically-informed twin studies of divorce and children's adjustment, step-father presence and early menarche, harsh parenting and child well- being, and parental conflict and child adjustment. Twin studies allow for complete (in co-twin control designs) or partial (in children of twin designs) control for genetic selection. Twin studies also control for the shared environment, because twins share family experiences in addition to genetic background. Thus, twin studies afford control for genetic background, measured experience, and unmeasured shared experience. We propose to use the Australian Twin Registry, AddHealth, and the Virginia 30,000 to distinguish genetic and shared environmental selection effects from the likely causal effects of teen pregnancy, divorce, stable marriage, and religious participation on the emotional and physical well being of parents and children. Public Health Relevance: Family difficulties are linked with adverse physical and mental health outcomes in children and parents. Because family experience is not random, we do not know whether family troubles cause these problems. Twin studies uniquely control for genetic and shared environmental selection effects, thus refining distinctions between outcomes merely correlated with teen pregnancy, divorce, stable marriage, and religious participation from outcomes caused (or prevented) by these major family experiences.

描述（由申请人提供）：家庭经历，尤其是家庭结构的广泛研究文件是儿童和父母的一系列不良身心健康结果的风险（或保护性）因素。但是，家庭生活在多大程度上引起不良结果的程度受到质疑。父母和孩子都没有随机体验家庭生活；相反，基于已知（和未知）特征的家庭经历“选择”个人。众所周知，众所周知，人们会选择成为我们重点的主要家庭经历 - 青少年怀孕，离婚，稳定的婚姻和宗教参与 - 在人口层面上发生。选择也可能基于未测量的背景经验和个体特征，包括遗传介导的选择效应，例如人格（例如反社会行为）或身体特征（例如，首先是年龄的年龄）。行为遗传研究人员将其称为基因环境相关性，并表明混淆使现有的社会科学研究对家庭生活无法解释。我们认真对待这一关注，并进行了对离婚和儿童调整，继父的存在以及早期初潮，苛刻的育儿和孩子的遗传性双胞胎研究，以及父母的冲突和儿童调整。双胞胎研究允许完整（在联合控制设计中）或部分（在双胞胎设计的儿童中）进行遗传选择。双胞胎研究还控制着共享环境，因为双胞胎除了遗传背景外共享家庭经验。因此，双胞胎研究可以控制遗传背景，测量经验和未得到的共享经验。我们建议使用澳大利亚双胞胎注册表，AddHealth和Virginia 30,000，以区分遗传和共享的环境选择影响与青少年怀孕，离婚，稳定婚姻以及宗教参与对父母和孩子的情感和身体健康的可能因果关系的可能影响。公共卫生相关性：家庭困难与儿童和父母的身体和心理健康状况不利有关。因为家庭经历不是随机的，所以我们不知道家庭烦恼是否会导致这些问题。双胞胎研究独特地控制了遗传和共享的环境选择效应，因此结局之间的区别仅与青少年怀孕，离婚，稳定的婚姻以及宗教参与造成的（或预防）这些主要家庭经历相关的宗教参与。