Abstract
The study of how variation in genetic endowment affects behaviour has shown that a surprisingly wide range of human activities are subject to substantial genetic influence. Studies of the covariance of traits in more and less distant relatives that take into account the impact of family environment have been the main method used to demonstrate this. This article provides a brief introduction to the mechanisms of heredity, and then a discussion of the methods used by behavioural geneticists and their limitations. Both the traditional variance decomposition methods and the newer molecular genetic methods are described and discussed.
This chapter was originally published in The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics, 2nd edition, 2008. Edited by Steven N. Durlauf and Lawrence E. Blume
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Dickens, W.T. (2008). Behavioural Genetics. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_2153-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95121-5_2153-1
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