RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Genome-wide analyses of empathy and systemizing: correlations with psychiatric conditions, psychological traits, and education
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 050682
DO 10.1101/050682
A1 Varun Warrier
A1 Roberto Toro
A1 Bhismadev Chakrabarti
A1 Nadia Litterman
A1 David A. Hinds
A1 Thomas Bourgeron
A1 Simon Baron-Cohen
YR 2017
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/02/23/050682.abstract
AB Background Empathy and systemizing are dimensions of individual differences in cognition, and reveal areas of difficulty or strength in different psychiatric conditions. However, it is unclear how they contribute to genetic risk or resilience in various psychiatric conditions.Methods Here we report the largest genome-wide association study (GWAS) to date of empathy and systemizing using the Empathy Quotient (EQ) (n = 46,861) and the Systemizing Quotient-Revised (SQ-R) (n = 51,564) in participants from 23andMe, Inc.Results Both traits had a modest but significant narrow-sense heritability (EQ: 0.11 ± 0.014; P= 1.7×10−14 and SQ-R: 0.12 0.012; P=1.2×10−20). As predicted, based on earlier work, we ± confirmed a female-advantage on the EQ and a male-advantage on the SQ-R in our large sample. However, we did not identify significant differences in heritability between sexes. We found significant genetic correlation between the variants conferring higher EQ scores and higher risk for schizophrenia (P_FDRadjusted = 1.84×10−4) and anorexia nervosa (P_FDRadjusted = 4.05×10−3), extraversion, NEO-conscientiousness, and subjective wellbeing. The genetic variants conferring higher scores for the SQ-R were correlated with higher risk for schizophrenia (P_FDRadjusted = 8.64×10−3), with NEO-Openness to experience, and measures of educational attainment.Conclusions This study provides the first genetic confirmation of the roles of empathy and systemizing in psychiatric conditions, psychological traits and education.