Within-sibship genome-wide association analyses decrease bias in estimates of direct genetic effects.

Estimates from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of unrelated individuals capture effects of inherited variation (direct effects), demography (population stratification, assortative mating) and relatives (indirect genetic effects). Family-based GWAS designs can control for demographic and indirect genetic effects, but large-scale family datasets have been lacking. We combined data from 178,086 siblings from 19 cohorts to generate population (between-family) and within-sibship (within-family) GWAS estimates for 25 phenotypes.

Genome-wide Association Study of Liking for Several Types of Physical Activity in the UK Biobank and Two Replication Cohorts.

Introduction: A lack of physical activity (PA) is one of the most pressing health issues today. Our individual propensity for PA is influenced by genetic factors. Stated liking of different PA types may help capture additional and informative dimensions of PA behavior genetics.

Genetic and environmental influences on quality of life: The COVID-19 pandemic as a natural experiment.

By treating the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic as a natural experiment, we examine the influence of substantial environmental change (i.e., lockdown measures) on individual differences in quality of life (QoL) in the Netherlands.

Major Depressive Disorder and Lifestyle: Correlated Genetic Effects in Extended Twin Pedigrees.

In recent years, evidence has accumulated with regard to the ubiquity of pleiotropy across the genome, and shared genetic etiology is thought to play a large role in the widespread comorbidity among psychiatric disorders and risk factors. Recent methods investigate pleiotropy by estimating genetic correlation from genome-wide association summary statistics. More comprehensive estimates can be derived from the known relatedness between genetic relatives.

Implementation and implications for polygenic risk scores in healthcare.

Increasing amounts of genetic data have led to the development of polygenic risk scores (PRSs) for a variety of diseases. These scores, built from the summary statistics of genome-wide association studies (GWASs), are able to stratify individuals based on their genetic risk of developing various common diseases and could potentially be used to optimize the use of screening and preventative treatments and improve personalized care for patients. Many challenges are yet to be overcome, including PRS validation, healthcare professional and patient education, and healthcare systems integration.

Genetic meta-analysis of twin birth weight shows high genetic correlation with singleton birth weight.

Birth weight (BW) is an important predictor of newborn survival and health and has associations with many adult health outcomes, including cardiometabolic disorders, autoimmune diseases and mental health. On average, twins have a lower BW than singletons as a result of a different pattern of fetal growth and shorter gestational duration. Therefore, investigations into the genetics of BW often exclude data from twins, leading to a reduction in sample size and remaining ambiguities concerning the genetic contribution to BW in twins.

Genetic analyses identify widespread sex-differential participation bias.

Genetic association results are often interpreted with the assumption that study participation does not affect downstream analyses. Understanding the genetic basis of participation bias is challenging since it requires the genotypes of unseen individuals. Here we demonstrate that it is possible to estimate comparative biases by performing a genome-wide association study contrasting one subgroup versus another.

Associations between the CADM2 gene, substance use, risky sexual behavior, and self-control: A phenome-wide association study.

Risky behaviors, such as substance use and unprotected sex, are associated with various physical and mental health problems. Recent genome-wide association studies indicated that variation in the cell adhesion molecule 2 (CADM2) gene plays a role in risky behaviors and self-control. In this phenome-wide scan for risky behavior, it was tested if underlying common vulnerability could be (partly) explained by pleiotropic effects of this gene and how large the effects were.

An Extended Twin-Pedigree Study of Different Classes of Voluntary Exercise Behavior.

We investigated the familial clustering of different classes of voluntary regular exercise behavior in extended twin-family pedigrees. In contrast to the earlier work based on twin data only, this allowed us to estimate the contributions of shared household effects (C), additive (A), and non-additive (D) genetic effects on voluntary exercise behavior. To test whether shared household effects were inflated by assortative mating we examined the causes of spousal resemblance.

Author Correction: GWAS of lifetime cannabis use reveals new risk loci, genetic overlap with psychiatric traits, and a causal effect of schizophrenia liability.

Several occurrences of the word 'schizophrenia' have been re-worded as 'liability to schizophrenia' or 'schizophrenia risk', including in the title, which should have been "GWAS of lifetime cannabis use reveals new risk loci, genetic overlap with psychiatric traits, and a causal effect of schizophrenia liability," as well as in Supplementary Figures 1-10 and Supplementary Tables 7-10, to more accurately reflect the findings of the work.

Tracking of voluntary exercise behaviour over the lifespan.

Background: The aim of many physical activity interventions is to develop life-long habits of regular exercise and sports activities in leisure time. Previous studies that assessed tracking (i.e.

GWAS of lifetime cannabis use reveals new risk loci, genetic overlap with psychiatric traits, and a causal influence of schizophrenia.

Cannabis use is a heritable trait that has been associated with adverse mental health outcomes. In the largest genome-wide association study (GWAS) for lifetime cannabis use to date (N = 184,765), we identified eight genome-wide significant independent single nucleotide polymorphisms in six regions. All measured genetic variants combined explained 11% of the variance.

Dopaminergic Genetic Variants and Voluntary Externally Paced Exercise Behavior.

Purpose: Most candidate gene studies on the neurobiology of voluntary exercise behavior have focused on the dopaminergic signaling pathway and its role in the mesolimbic reward system. We hypothesized that dopaminergic candidate genes may influence exercise behavior through additional effects on executive functioning and that these effects are only detected when the types of exercise activity are taken into account.

Methods: Data on voluntary exercise behavior and at least one single-nucleotide polymorphism/variable number of tandem repeat (VNTR) were available for 12,929 participants of the Netherlands Twin Registry.