University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
Psychol Med. 2013 Feb;43(2):413-22. doi: 10.1017/S0033291712001201. Epub 2012 Aug 8.
Many psychological traits become increasingly influenced by genetic factors throughout development, including several that might intuitively be seen as purely environmental characteristics. One such trait is the parent-child relationship, which is associated with a variety of socially significant outcomes, including mental health and criminal behavior. Genetic factors have been shown to partially underlie some of these associations, but the changing role of genetic influence over time remains poorly understood.
Over 1000 participants in a longitudinal twin study were assessed at three points across adolescence with a self-report measure regarding the levels of warmth and conflict in their relationships with their parents. These reports were analyzed with a biometric growth curve model to identify changes in genetic and environmental influences over time.
Genetic influence on the child-reported relationship with parent increased throughout adolescence, while the relationship's quality deteriorated. The increase in genetic influence resulted primarily from a positive association between genetic factors responsible for the initial relationship and those involved in change in the relationship over time. By contrast, environmental factors relating to change were negatively related to those involved in the initial relationship.
The increasing genetic influence seems to be due to early genetic influences having greater freedom of expression over time whereas environmental circumstances were decreasingly important to variance in the parent-child relationship. We infer that the parent-child relationship may become increasingly influenced by the particular characteristics of the child (many of which are genetically influenced), gradually displacing the effects of parental or societal ideas of child rearing.
许多心理特征在整个发展过程中受到遗传因素的影响越来越大，包括一些直觉上被认为是纯粹环境特征的特征。亲子关系就是这样一种特征，它与许多具有社会重要意义的结果有关，包括心理健康和犯罪行为。遗传因素已被证明部分解释了这些关联中的一些，但遗传影响随时间变化的作用仍知之甚少。
在一项纵向双胞胎研究中，超过 1000 名参与者在青春期的三个时间点接受了一项自我报告的测试，该测试涉及他们与父母关系中温暖和冲突的程度。这些报告通过生物计量增长曲线模型进行了分析，以确定遗传和环境影响随时间的变化。
亲子关系中遗传对子女报告的影响在整个青春期内增加，而关系的质量却恶化了。遗传影响的增加主要是由于负责初始关系的遗传因素与随时间变化的关系中涉及的遗传因素之间存在正相关。相比之下，与变化相关的环境因素与初始关系中涉及的因素呈负相关。
遗传影响的增加似乎是由于早期的遗传影响随着时间的推移有更大的表达自由，而环境情况对亲子关系的变化的重要性降低。我们推断，亲子关系可能会受到孩子的特殊特征（其中许多受遗传影响）的影响越来越大，逐渐取代了父母或社会对育儿观念的影响。
