SOC 207 Assignment: Link Between Intelligence And Genetics

Intelligence
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INTELLIGENCE AND GENETICS
Introduction
The genetic information that is transferred from a parent to their child is quite complex, such as health conditions, skin color, height, color of the eyes and even athletic abilities. There is also one important attribute that is passed on from the parents to their children and it determines their growth as individuals and as part of the larger society, intelligence. Parents also pass on part of their intelligence to their children through their genes. It is important to understand to what extent parents influence the intelligence of the children. This paper reviews literature on this topic to establish some of the viewpoints that have been deliberated on in the past and establish the truth of the matter. The literature in question includes the paper by Hanscombe, Trzaskowski, Haworth, Davis, Dale and Plomin that was published in the year 2012, Toga and Thompson’s paper of 2005 and Kovas and Plomin of 2005. All the material used in the literature review discuss the topic in length, with reference trying to establish the extent to which the element of genes affects the abilities or limitations of a child’s mental faculties. The paper reviews intelligence passed down through genetic material, with a bias on genetic structures, learning abilities and disabilities associated with the same as well as the impacts that the environment has on intelligence as opposed to genetic inheritance. This is a topic that sparks quite some interest relative to the impact that genetic have on the element of continuity in the human and other races. As such, researchers have been quite keen over the ages to try and determine the impact that genetic material has on intelligence as opposed to intellect that comes from interacting with the environment.
The Link between Intelligence and Genetics
Testing for intelligence can be traced back to the year 1897, at a time when the French psychologists Alfred Binet and Theodore Simon carried out tests to establish children that required remedial teaching. This bring out the quest to understand what intelligence really is (Deary, 2013). In context of the paper, intelligence can be defined as the level of or ability of being competent and accomplishment (Sternberg, 2012). In reference to neuroscience it can be referred to as the general cognitive ability.
Learning abilities and disabilities have been linked to the genetic material that is passed on to the children from their parents. Genetic research indicates that identical twins who are monozygotic tend to have higher simulates when it comes to their ability to read and learn along with disabilities in the same lines. This is different when it comes to the dizygotic twins, as they have slightly different genetic material coming from different zygotes. In their research paper Yulia Kovas and Robert Plomin, point out that there are differences between the identical twins and the fraternal twins when it comes to their abilities and disabilities to learn in reference to language or even mathematics.
‘A review of twin studies of language disability reported concordance (the likelihood that one twin will be affected if the other twin is affected) of 75% for monozygotic (MZ, identical) twins and 43% for dizygotic (DZ, fraternal) twins (Stromswold, 2001). For reading disability, the concordances for MZ and DZ twins are 84% and 48%, respectively. For mathematics disability, the concordances are about 70% for MZ twins and 50% for DZ twins (Oliver et al., 2004). Such studies consistently indicate substantial heritability for learning abilities as well as for disabilities. Genetic research has moved beyond merely demonstrating the importance of genetic influence to ask more interesting questions. Multivariate genetic analysis makes it possible to ask questions about the genetic and environmental links between and within learning abilities and disabilities. The analysis focuses on the covariance (correlation) between two traits (bivariate) or multiple traits (multivariate) and uses the twin method to estimate genetic and environmental contributions to their covariance as well as the variance of each trait. In other words, multivariate genetic analysis estimates the extent to which genetic and environmental factors that affect one trait also affect another trait.’ (Kovas & Plomin, 2007)
According to the findings of the study, there is a significance indication that intelligence is inheritable much like other traits. This is with reference to the fact that there is a genetic correlation for both learning abilities and disabilities in the subjects tested (Kovas & Plomin, 2007). As such there is an indication that genes have a significant impact on ability to learn and lack of the ability thereof. With genetic correlation established as high as 0.7 for reading and math,...