Associations between polygenic scores for cognitive and non-cognitive factors of educational attainment and measures of behavior, psychopathology, and neuroimaging in the adolescent brain cognitive development study.

Background: Educational attainment (EduA) is correlated with life outcomes, and EduA itself is influenced by both cognitive and non-cognitive factors. A recent study performed a 'genome-wide association study (GWAS) by subtraction,' subtracting genetic effects for cognitive performance from an educational attainment GWAS to create orthogonal 'cognitive' and 'non-cognitive' factors. These cognitive and non-cognitive factors showed associations with behavioral health outcomes in adults; however, whether these correlations are present during childhood is unclear.

Associations Between Polygenic Scores for Cognitive and Non-cognitive Factors of Educational Attainment and Measures of Behavior, Psychopathology, and Neuroimaging in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study.

Background: Both cognitive and non-cognitive (e.g., traits like curiosity) factors are critical for social and emotional functioning and independently predict educational attainment.