Imagine a garden with the perfect amount of sunlight and different flowers in the garden. The difference between the plant's heights is because of the different seeds planted. The differences are genetic. Imagine another garden with different flowers that are neglected. The flowers will be shorter than the plants in the rich, well-resourced garden. The difference between the tall and short plants across very different environments is not just due to genetics. While this is obvious when it comes to plants, it's difficult for people to keep in mind.

Two gardens - a thought experiment

Just because a gene influences the probaility of an outcome in one group of people to the point that it's probabilistic rather than deterministic doesn't mean that it is portable when another group of people are studied. Heritable means that within a group of people that have experienced roughly equivalent environmental conditions,  genetic differences between them are related to the phenotypic differences between them.

Gene influences

The relationship between heritability and response to the environment is complicated. Heritability is the proportion of variation in a population due to genetic differences between people. People often misinterpret heritable as 'genetically determined and unmodifiable by the environment.' But it doesn't mean that. Genetic studies that ignore the environment and only look for the main effects of genes require sample sizes above one million people. Adding gene-by-environment interaction, the problems get even bigger.

Heritability is often misunderstood

This interview is an episode from The Well, our new publication about ideas that inspire a life well-lived, created with the John Templeton Foundation. Subscribe to The Well on YouTube ► https://bit.ly/thewell-youtube Watch Kathryn Paige Harden's next interview ► Schools ignore genetics—and that’s actually a bad thing https://youtu.be/-xavEnSBeio The relationship between genetics and the environment is incredibly complex. The term "heritability" refers to the proportion of variation in a population that is due to genetic differences. But people misinterpret the word to mean "genetically determined," "unmodifiable," or "innate" — but it doesn't mean any of these things. Just because a version of a gene might be linked to a particular outcome in one group of people does not mean it is linked to the same outcome in another group of people. Read the video transcript ► https://bigthink.com/the-well/nature-versus-nurture/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- About Kathryn Paige Harden: Dr. Kathryn Paige Harden is a tenured professor in the Department of Psychology at UT, where she leads the Developmental Behavior Genetics lab and co-directs the Texas Twin Project. She is the author of The Genetic Lottery: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality (Princeton). Dr. Harden received her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Virginia and completed her clinical internship at McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Read more from The Well: I put a camera on a monkey. Here’s how it shook my understanding of humanity ► https://bigthink.com/the-well/awe-ani... Atheism is not as rare or as rational as you think ► https://bigthink.com/the-well/atheism... System 1 vs. System 2 thinking: Why it isn’t strategic to always be rational ► https://bigthink.com/the-well/system-... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- About The Well Do we inhabit a multiverse? Do we have free will? What is love? Is evolution directional? There are no simple answers to life’s biggest questions, and that’s why they’re the questions occupying the world’s brightest minds. So what do they think? How is the power of science advancing understanding? How are philosophers and theologians tackling these fascinating questions? Let’s dive into The Well. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Join The Well on your favorite platforms: ► Facebook: https://bit.ly/thewellFB ► Instagram: https://bit.ly/thewellIG

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This interview is an episode from The Well, our new publication about ideas that inspire a life well-lived, created with the John Templeton Foundation.

Subscribe to The Well on YouTube ► https://bit.ly/thewell-youtube
Watch Kathryn Paige Harden's next interview ► Schools ignore genetics—and that’s actually a bad thing https://youtu.be/-xavEnSBeio

The relationship between genetics and the environment is incredibly complex.

The term "heritability" refers to the proportion of variation in a population that is due to genetic differences. But people misinterpret the word to mean "genetically determined," "unmodifiable," or "innate" — but it doesn't mean any of these things.

Just because a version of a gene might be linked to a particular outcome in one group of people does not mean it is linked to the same outcome in another group of people.

Read the video transcript ► https://bigthink.com/the-well/nature-versus-nurture/ 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

About Kathryn Paige Harden:
Dr. Kathryn Paige Harden is a tenured professor in the Department of Psychology at UT, where she leads the Developmental Behavior Genetics lab and co-directs the Texas Twin Project. She is the author of The Genetic Lottery: Why DNA Matters for Social Equality (Princeton). Dr. Harden received her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Virginia and completed her clinical internship at McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School. 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

Read more from The Well: 
I put a camera on a monkey. Here’s how it shook my understanding of humanity
► https://bigthink.com/the-well/awe-ani...
Atheism is not as rare or as rational as you think
► https://bigthink.com/the-well/atheism...
System 1 vs. System 2 thinking: Why it isn’t strategic to always be rational
► https://bigthink.com/the-well/system-...

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

About The Well
Do we inhabit a multiverse? Do we have free will? What is love? Is evolution directional? There are no simple answers to life’s biggest questions, and that’s why they’re the questions occupying the world’s brightest minds.

So what do they think?

How is the power of science advancing understanding? How are philosophers and theologians tackling these fascinating questions?

Let’s dive into The Well.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

Join The Well on your favorite platforms:
► Facebook: https://bit.ly/thewellFB 
► Instagram: https://bit.ly/thewellIG

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Heritability is often misunderstood

Two gardens - a thought experiment

Gene influences

Is success genetic? | Kathryn Paige Harden