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Dutch researchers find 40 intelligence genes
How intelligent a person is depends on various factors. The genes are also responsible for this. A research team has now identified around 40 genes that affect our intelligence.
Intelligence is partly hereditary
It is known that intelligence can change over the life course. Thus, scientists have found that the performance of the brain decreases, inter alia, through routine work. On the other hand, smart friends and families can make us smarter. Intelligence is partly but also hereditary. This has long been known to scientists. A research team has now found around 40 genes that promote the development of intelligence.
It has long been known that intelligence is also partly hereditary. A research team has now found around 40 genes that promote the development of intelligence. (Image: Robert Kneschke / fotolia.com) Intelligence differences also due to genetic factors
In order to reach their conclusions, Danielle Posthuma's scientists from the Free University of Amsterdam have analyzed data from several studies involving almost 20,000 children and almost 60,000 adults from Europe.
With the new results, intelligence differences between humans can be explained to nearly five percent by known genetic factors. This is a total of about a doubling compared to the previous knowledge, the researchers report in the journal "Nature Genetics".
The genetic factors include not only genes, but also tiny changes in the genetic material strand - so-called single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) - which were also discovered by the scientists.
As the news agency dpa reports, most genes now discovered play a role in the brain, such as in the construction of nerve cells.
Thus, the genes of intelligence were not only associated with a high learning success, but also with the renunciation of smoking, childhood brain circumference, autism, height and longevity.
By contrast, Alzheimer's disease, depression, schizophrenia, hyperactivity, and anxiety were negatively correlated.
Researchers disagree on the role of genetic determination
According to the experts, previous studies showed that childhood intelligence is 45 percent genetic, 80 percent adult.
However, not all researchers agree on the percentages. For example, the psychologist Rainer Riemann of the University of Bielefeld assumes 40 percent genetic determination in children and 60 percent in adults.
He also emphasizes the influence of external factors. "We now know that intelligence-related genes do not just unfold, but a stimulating environment is needed to develop their skills," Riemann explained in the dpa announcement.
"If you lock someone with a full potential in a dark room, then no intelligence can develop."
Little practical benefit
According to a twin study in the US, differences in intelligence among children from socially disadvantaged families are not at all dependent on genetic factors.
Only in the case of children from privileged families did the manifestation of the putative influence of genetic material manifest itself.
According to dpa, Elsbeth Stern from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, who was not involved in the study, said that the practical meaning of the study was still limited: "It is only when one finally finds genes from which reliable learning disorders can be deduced that one would be able to do so earlier start with targeted support measures. "
But even if genetics continues to make progress, it is not to be feared that the intelligence of a person will be read by his genes at some point. According to Stern, intelligence is too much determined by the environment.
"When genetically identical seeds are planted in good or bad locations, there are also differences," says the expert.
The Bielefeld psychologist Riemann warned in the agency report before an overestimation of genetic factors.
According to him, intelligence is a necessary but not sufficient condition for good school performance. If a normally talented child invests a lot in learning, it also has a better chance of getting good school performance. (Ad)