King's College London, MRC Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, London, UK.
Mol Psychiatry. 2012 Sep;17(9):867-74. doi: 10.1038/mp.2012.68. Epub 2012 Jun 12.
Twin studies allow us to estimate the relative contributions of nature and nurture to human phenotypes by comparing the resemblance of identical and fraternal twins. Variation in complex traits is a balance of genetic and environmental influences; these influences are typically estimated at a population level. However, what if the balance of nature and nurture varies depending on where we grow up? Here we use statistical and visual analysis of geocoded data from over 6700 families to show that genetic and environmental contributions to 45 childhood cognitive and behavioral phenotypes vary geographically in the United Kingdom. This has implications for detecting environmental exposures that may interact with the genetic influences on complex traits, and for the statistical power of samples recruited for genetic association studies. More broadly, our experience demonstrates the potential for collaborative exploratory visualization to act as a lingua franca for large-scale interdisciplinary research.
双生子研究通过比较同卵双胞胎和异卵双胞胎的相似性，来估计先天和后天对人类表型的相对贡献。复杂特征的变化是遗传和环境影响的平衡；这些影响通常在人群水平上进行估计。但是，如果先天和后天的平衡因我们成长的环境而异，会怎样呢？在这里，我们使用来自 6700 多个家庭的地理编码数据的统计和可视化分析，表明遗传和环境对英国 45 种儿童认知和行为表型的贡献在地理上存在差异。这对检测可能与复杂特征的遗传影响相互作用的环境暴露，以及对遗传关联研究中招募的样本的统计能力都有影响。更广泛地说，我们的经验证明了协作探索性可视化作为大规模跨学科研究通用语言的潜力。
