Department of Psychology The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Jerusalem Israel.
Brain Behav. 2017 Apr 4;7(5):e00685. doi: 10.1002/brb3.685. eCollection 2017 May.
Parental warmth has been associated with various child behaviors, from effortful control to callous-unemotional traits. Factors that have been shown to affect parental warmth include heritability and child behavior. However, there is limited knowledge about which specific genes are involved, how they interact with child behavior, how they affect differential parenting, and how they affect fathers. We examined what affects paternal and maternal warmth by focusing on the child's prosocial behavior and parents' genotype, specifically a Valine to Methionine substitution at codon 66 in the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) gene.
Data was available from a sample of 6.5 year-old twins, consisting of 369 mothers and 663 children and 255 fathers and 458 children. Self-reports were used to assess mothers' and fathers' warmth. Child prosociality was assessed with the other-parent report and experimental assessments.
Mothers' warmth was not affected by their BDNF genotype, neither as a main effect nor in an interaction with child prosociality. Fathers with the Met allele scored higher on warmth. Additionally, there was a significant interaction between fathers' BDNF genotype and child prosociality. For fathers with the Met allele there was a positive association between warmth and child prosociality. Conversely, for fathers with the Val/Val genotype there was no association between warmth and child prosociality. Results were repeated longitudinally in a subsample with data on age 8-9 years. A direct within family analysis showed that fathers with the Met allele were more likely than Val/Val carriers to exhibit differential parenting toward twins who differed in their prosocial behavior. The same pattern of findings was found with mother-rated and experimentally assessed prosociality.
These results shed light on the genetic and environmental underpinnings of paternal behavior and differential parenting.
父母的温暖与各种儿童行为有关，从努力控制到无情特质。已显示影响父母温暖的因素包括遗传率和儿童行为。然而，关于涉及哪些特定基因、它们如何与儿童行为相互作用、如何影响差异化育儿以及如何影响父亲的知识有限。我们通过关注孩子的亲社会行为和父母的基因型，特别是脑源性神经营养因子（BDNF）基因 66 密码子处的缬氨酸到蛋氨酸取代，来研究哪些因素影响父亲和母亲的温暖。
数据来自一个 6.5 岁双胞胎样本，其中包括 369 名母亲和 663 名儿童以及 255 名父亲和 458 名儿童。自我报告用于评估母亲和父亲的温暖。儿童亲社会行为通过其他父母报告和实验评估进行评估。
母亲的温暖不受其 BDNF 基因型的影响，无论是作为主要影响还是与儿童亲社会行为的相互作用。携带 Met 等位基因的父亲得分更高。此外，父亲的 BDNF 基因型与儿童亲社会行为之间存在显著的相互作用。对于携带 Met 等位基因的父亲，温暖与儿童亲社会行为之间存在正相关。相反，对于携带 Val/Val 基因型的父亲，温暖与儿童亲社会行为之间没有关联。在有年龄 8-9 岁数据的子样本中，结果进行了纵向重复。一项直接的家庭内分析表明，携带 Met 等位基因的父亲比 Val/Val 携带者更有可能对亲社会行为不同的双胞胎表现出差异化育儿。同样的发现模式也存在于母亲评定和实验评估的亲社会行为中。
这些结果揭示了父亲行为和差异化育儿的遗传和环境基础。
