Abstract
The current study evaluated the differential-susceptibility hypothesis in explaining the intergenerational transmission of
parenting, using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health). Exposure to maternal parenting
was measured prospectively when respondents were adolescents and parental stress was measured when they were parents themselves,
some 14 years later, on average. Cumulative-genetic plasticity was measured by dominantly coding the presence of putative
plasticity alleles from four genes: the 10R allele of DAT1, the A1 allele of DRD2, the 7R allele of DRD4, and the short allele
of 5HTTLPR. Results showed that the more plasticity alleles individuals carried (range 0–4), the more that parenting experienced
in adolescence predicted future parenting experience. Those respondents with the most plasticity alleles not only experienced
the highest levels of parental stress when exposed to negative maternal parenting in adolescence but the lowest levels when
exposed to positive maternal parenting in adolescence. These results indicate that differential susceptibility is operative
in the case of the intergenerational transmission of parenting, which could explain why estimates of such transmission have
proven so modest in studies which fail to consider GXE interactions.
parenting, using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health). Exposure to maternal parenting
was measured prospectively when respondents were adolescents and parental stress was measured when they were parents themselves,
some 14 years later, on average. Cumulative-genetic plasticity was measured by dominantly coding the presence of putative
plasticity alleles from four genes: the 10R allele of DAT1, the A1 allele of DRD2, the 7R allele of DRD4, and the short allele
of 5HTTLPR. Results showed that the more plasticity alleles individuals carried (range 0–4), the more that parenting experienced
in adolescence predicted future parenting experience. Those respondents with the most plasticity alleles not only experienced
the highest levels of parental stress when exposed to negative maternal parenting in adolescence but the lowest levels when
exposed to positive maternal parenting in adolescence. These results indicate that differential susceptibility is operative
in the case of the intergenerational transmission of parenting, which could explain why estimates of such transmission have
proven so modest in studies which fail to consider GXE interactions.
- Content Type Journal Article
- Pages 1-12
- DOI 10.1007/s11126-011-9180-4
- Authors
- Kevin M. Beaver, College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Florida State University, 634 West Call Street, Tallahassee, FL 32306-1127, USA
- Jay Belsky, Human and Community Development, University of California, Davis, CA, USA
- Journal Psychiatric Quarterly
- Online ISSN 1573-6709
- Print ISSN 0033-2720