Why nurture is just as important as nature for understanding genetics

We live in the age of the genome. Hardly a week goes by without a story about how genes influence our health or behaviour. There has been recent excitement around new advances in the genetics of schizophrenia, and genetic overlap between reading and maths. In the UK, the government is also pushing forward plans to map 100,000 genomes that will be matched to clinical data to drive “genomic medicine as part of routine care” in the NHS.

But genetic variation is only half the story. Environmental influences are important too, and we now know that our environments can interact with our genetic makeup, in ways that can be good and bad for our health.

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The way I heard it put - genetics load the gun, and the environment pulls the trigger.

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Way to much emphasis on the chemical imbalance by Doctors. Although the last thing I wanted to talk on, until the last ten years is talk about all the drama I’ve gone through. Then again, wasn’t until my dad was diagnosed with PTSD (ten years after all my problems) that things started to make more sense to me on my home environment growing up.

Not all people with negative social experiences/trauma develop severe mental illness= evidence for genetic contribution.

Not all identical twins have severe mental illness= evidence for environmental/social contribution.

I think the degree to which each contributes will vary from individual to individual.