Why twin studies really don't tell us much about human heritability

The derivation of heritability from human twin studies involves serious methodological flaws. Heritability is consistently overestimated because of biological confounds of twinning, consistent and often gross underestimation of the environmental variance, and nonadditive genetic influences that can...

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Veröffentlicht in:The Behavioral and brain sciences 1999-10, Vol.22 (5), p.904-905
1. Verfasser: Segalowitz, Sidney J.
Format: Artikel
Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:The derivation of heritability from human twin studies involves serious methodological flaws. Heritability is consistently overestimated because of biological confounds of twinning, consistent and often gross underestimation of the environmental variance, and nonadditive genetic influences that can hugely exaggerate heritability values. Despite this bad research design, behaviour geneticists continue to publish results implying that their heritability results are valid.
ISSN:0140-525X
1469-1825
DOI:10.1017/S0140525X99442207