
Study links brain anatomy, academic achievement, and family income - kercker
http://newsoffice.mit.edu/2015/link-brain-to-anatomy-academic-achievement-family-income-0417
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formulaT
I didn't see any reason why these differences might not be genetic: genes
cause changes in the brain which cause changes in academic achievement which
cause socio-economic status.

It would be interesting to see studies that isolated the effects of genes and
environment.

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s0uthPaw88
There are a number of natural experiments that researchers have used to
examine this question:

[1]A study looking at the performance of Korean-American adopted children
relative to their siblings:
[http://www.nber.org/papers/w10894](http://www.nber.org/papers/w10894)

[2]The impact of various welfare programs on student achievement:
[http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3208322/](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3208322/)

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rubyfan
It's not immediately clear to me why those carrying out the study seem to
interpret their results as justification for policy making and intervention.
Serious question, is it not possible that we observe a cause and effect here?
Ie. higher mental capacity leads to doing better in life?

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anon4this1
because in the brainwashed world of academia (and especially psychology) this
is the more politically correct explanation, which is more likely to get
published, get funding grants, get admiration from departmental peers, get
media attention, avoid embarrassment for your self/your family/your
department/your institution.

James Watson won a nobel prize for elucidating the structure of DNA and was
still only 2 non-PC comments away from becoming a pariah.

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s0uthPaw88
Or maybe it is because there are many researchers who have actually studied
the data and found that environmental factors play a large role. A summary of
some of the research in this area:

[http://futureofchildren.org/publications/journals/article/in...](http://futureofchildren.org/publications/journals/article/index.xml?journalid=35&articleid=89&sectionid=541)

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anon4this1
I'm not disputing the role of environmental factors, I'm just questioning how
the potential role of genetics has been diminished in this study without
justification.

Also, from your link the only study with ability to isolate causation (the
adopted korean study) found "23 percent of educational attainment is
determined by environment, implying that up to 77 percent is determined by
nature.".

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felixbraun
Related: Your DNA may carry a ‘memory’ of your living conditions in childhood.

[http://scienceblog.com/48584/your-dna-may-
carry-a-‘memory’-o...](http://scienceblog.com/48584/your-dna-may-
carry-a-‘memory’-of-your-living-conditions-in-childhood)

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d0mdo0ss
from another related article[1], "A working hypothesis is that socio-economic
circumstances leave their mark on the epigenome leading to stable changes in
expression of genes critical for human health, such as those involved in
cardiovascular, immune, stress response and behavioural pathologies"

[1] Associations with early-life socio-economic position in adult DNA
methylation. Int J Epidemiol. 2012 Feb; 41(1): 62–74.

