The Shared Etiology of Attentional Control and Anxiety: An Adolescent Twin Study. Academic Article

abstract

• We investigated the etiology of attentional control (AC) and four different anxiety symptom types (generalized, obsessive-compulsive, separation, and social) in an adolescent sample of over 400 twin pairs. Genetic factors contributed to 55% of the variance in AC and between 43 and 58% of the variance in anxiety. Negative phenotypic associations between AC and anxiety indicated that lower attentional ability is related to increased risk for all 4 anxiety categories. Genetic correlations between AC and anxiety phenotypes ranged from -.36 to -.47, with evidence of nonshared environmental covariance between AC and generalized and separation anxiety. Results suggest that AC is a phenotypic and genetic risk factor for anxiety in early adolescence, with somewhat differing levels of risk depending on symptomatology.

authors

• Gagne, Jeffrey

published proceedings

• J Res Adolesc

altmetric score

• 86.192

author list (cited authors)

• Gagne, J. R., O'Sullivan, D. L., Schmidt, N. L., Spann, C. A., & Goldsmith, H. H.

citation count

• 17

complete list of authors

• Gagne, Jeffrey R||O'Sullivan, Deirdre L||Schmidt, Nicole L||Spann, Catherine A||Goldsmith, H Hill

publication date

• March 2017

publisher

• Wiley  Publisher

published in

• Journal of Research on Adolescence  Journal

keywords

• Adolescent
• Adolescent Behavior
• Adolescent Development
• Anxiety
• Attention
• Factor Analysis, Statistical
• Female
• Gene-environment Interaction
• Humans
• Inheritance Patterns
• Male
• Obsessive-compulsive Disorder
• Phenotype
• Quantitative Trait, Heritable
• Temperament
• Twins

PubMed Central ID

• 28498525

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

• 10.1111/jora.12260

start page

• 122

end page

• 138

volume

• 27

issue

• 1

URL

• http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jora.12260