Morosoli J J, Barlow F K, Colodro-Conde L, Medland S E
Mental Health and Neuroscience Department, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Royal Brisbane Hospital, 300 Herston Rd, Locked Bag 2000, Brisbane, QLD, 4029, Australia.
School of Psychology, University of Queensland, Brisbane, QLD, Australia.
Behav Genet. 2022 May;52(3):170-183. doi: 10.1007/s10519-022-10101-2. Epub 2022 Apr 3.
Biological essentialism, the belief that human attributes are determined by biology, is a core component of essentialist thinking. Previous studies have shown that individual differences in essentialist thinking are associated with heuristic thinking, cognitive ability and style, conservative values, and prejudice. None, however, have examined whether biological essentialism is itself heritable, or the extent to which familial aggregation explains associations with core correlates. In order to do this, we analyzed data from a genetically informative sample of families with twins in Australia (N = 2,103), as well as general population samples from the UK (N = 501) and the US (N = 500). Genetic factors had little influence in individual differences in biological essentialism or in its relationship with heuristic thinking. Conservative values were genetically correlated with cognitive styles (i.e., need for closure and heuristic thinking). These findings support a bigger role of genes in explaining the relationship between cognitive processes and moral reasoning and ideology than they do the association between cognitive processes and essentialist thinking.
生物本质主义，即认为人类属性由生物学决定的信念，是本质主义思维的核心组成部分。先前的研究表明，本质主义思维中的个体差异与启发式思维、认知能力和风格、保守价值观以及偏见有关。然而，尚无研究考察生物本质主义本身是否可遗传，或者家族聚集在多大程度上解释了与核心相关因素的关联。为了做到这一点，我们分析了来自澳大利亚有双胞胎的家族的遗传信息样本数据（N = 2103），以及来自英国（N = 501）和美国（N = 500）的一般人群样本数据。遗传因素对生物本质主义的个体差异或其与启发式思维的关系影响甚微。保守价值观与认知风格（即对封闭性的需求和启发式思维）存在遗传相关性。这些发现支持了基因在解释认知过程与道德推理及意识形态之间的关系方面比在解释认知过程与本质主义思维之间的关联方面发挥更大作用的观点。
