Behavioral genetic methodologies from twin and adoption studies through DNA analysis will be described and applied to address longstanding questions about the origins of individual differences in behavioral traits.
Behavioral genetic methodologies from twin and adoption studies through DNA analysis will be described and applied to address longstanding questions about the origins of individual differences in behavioral traits.
Psychology, Genetic Counseling, Genetics, Behavioral Medicine
4.8 (566 ratings)
AJ
Nov 16, 2020
it was extremely interesting and offered a very wide insight in the topic. I especially liked the format of the lecture - as a personal conversation, that kept me engaged the whole time.
SG
Jun 8, 2020
One of the finest courses available on Coursera! Proffesor Matt McGue is an excellent mentor who knows how to keep a class interesting. Would love to complete another course by him.
From the lesson
7
I am sure many of you wondered about the impact of age on biometric estimates when we discussed general cognitive ability last week. Indeed some of you asked about this issue on the Forums. You were right to raise the question because this is an important issue in the behavioral genetic literature. Given its importance, I thought it might work best to place the question of age moderation in a larger context, which we do this week. We will begin the week by returning to the distinction between shared and non-shared environmental influences, an important distinction in the behavioral genetic literature. You will see that while shared environmental influences are not important for most behavioral phenotypes, there are a few exceptions (including general cognitive ability). However, in all of these exceptional cases, the magnitude of shared environmental influences decreases with age as the heritability increases. To understand this developmental pattern, at least from a behavioral genetic perspective, it is helpful to consider mechanisms of gene-environment correlation as well as behavioral genetic perspectives on family socialization. We end this unit with an overview of behavioral genetic research on aging.
Regents Professor