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Why twin studies really don't tell us much about human heritability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 October 1999

Sidney J. Segalowitz
Sidney J. Segalowitz
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario L2S 3A1 Canadassegalow@brocku.ca
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Abstract

The derivation of heritability from human twin studies involves serious methodological flaws. Heritability is consistently overestimated because of biological confounds of twinning, consistent and often gross underestimation of the environmental variance, and nonadditive genetic influences that can hugely exaggerate heritability values. Despite this bad research design, behaviour geneticists continue to publish results implying that their heritability results are valid.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 22 , Issue 5 , October 1999 , pp. 904 - 905
Copyright
© 1999 Cambridge University Press

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