My last post brought up the endless discussion if people’s intelligence is mainly the product of nurture or nature. Now psychological scientist Christopher Chabris of Union College and David Laibson, a Harvard economist, have revealed that intelligence cannot be traced to a specific gene.
Previous studies of identical and fraternal twins have led us to believe that there might be such a gene as an IQ-gene, but after thorough investigation using large data sets that included both intelligence testing and genetic data, the researchers concluded that only one gene showed up and it had a very minimal effect.
This does not mean that genes do not play a part, only that there might be a combination of genes at play or genes in combination with environment. So no reason to sit back just because your daddy is a rocket scientist and your mama is a brain surgeon just yet!
Image: Luiz Fernando Reis/ Flickr