Chaney Sarah, Marks Sarah, Wynter Rebecca
Centre for the History of the Emotions, Queen Mary University of London, London, England, UK.
School of Historical Studies, Birkbeck University of London, London, England, UK.
Wellcome Open Res. 2024 Aug 8;9:208. doi: 10.12688/wellcomeopenres.20628.2. eCollection 2024.
For more than a century, scientists have tried to find the key to causation of mental ill health in heredity and genetics. The difficulty of finding clear and actionable answers in our genes has not stopped them looking. This history offers important context to understanding mental health science today.
This article explores the main themes in research on genetics and inheritance in psychiatry from the second half of the nineteenth century to the present day, to address the question: what is the history of genetics as a causative explanation in mental health science? We take a critical historical approach to the literature, interrogating primary and secondary material for the light it brings to the research question, while considering the social and historical context.
We begin with the statistics gathered in asylums and used to 'prove' the importance of heredity in mental ill health. We then move through early twentieth century Mendelian models of mental inheritance, the eugenics movement, the influence of social psychiatry, new classifications and techniques of the postwar era, the Human Genome Project and Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS) and epigenetics. Setting these themes in historical context shows that this research was often popular because of wider social, political and cultural issues, which impacted the views of scientists just as they did those of policymakers, journalists and the general public.
We argue that attempting to unpick this complex history is essential to the modern ethics of mental health and genetics, as well as helping to focus our efforts to better understand causation in mental ill-health.For a succinct timeline of the history of psychiatric genetics, alongside the history of other proposed causes for mental ill-health, visit: https://historyofcauses.co.uk/.
一个多世纪以来，科学家们一直试图找到精神疾病遗传和基因方面的致病关键。在我们的基因中寻找明确且可付诸行动的答案的困难并没有阻止他们的探索。这段历史为理解当今的心理健康科学提供了重要背景。
本文探讨了从19世纪下半叶至今精神病学中遗传学与遗传研究的主要主题，以回答这个问题：遗传学作为心理健康科学中病因解释的历史是怎样的？我们对文献采用批判性历史方法，审视一手和二手资料，看其如何阐明研究问题，同时考虑社会和历史背景。
我们从收容所收集的统计数据开始，这些数据曾被用来“证明”遗传在精神疾病中的重要性。然后我们探讨20世纪早期精神遗传的孟德尔模型、优生学运动、社会精神病学的影响、战后时代的新分类和技术、人类基因组计划和全基因组关联研究（GWAS）以及表观遗传学。将这些主题置于历史背景中表明，这项研究常常因更广泛的社会、政治和文化问题而受到欢迎，这些问题影响了科学家的观点，就如同它们对政策制定者、记者和公众的影响一样。
我们认为，梳理这段复杂的历史对于心理健康和遗传学的现代伦理至关重要，同时也有助于集中我们的精力，更好地理解精神疾病的病因。如需精神病遗传学历史的简要时间线，以及精神疾病其他假定病因的历史，请访问：https://historyofcauses.co.uk/ 。
