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. 2014 Oct;205(4):275-80.
doi: 10.1192/bjp.bp.113.130906. Epub 2014 Apr 10.

Psychiatric resilience: longitudinal twin study

Ananda B Amstadter  1 , John M Myers  1 , Kenneth S Kendler  1
Affiliations

Psychiatric resilience: longitudinal twin study

Ananda B Amstadter et al. Br J Psychiatry. 2014 Oct.

Abstract

Background: The source of variability in people's response to stressful life events is poorly understood.

Aims: We examine the genetic and environmental underpinning of resilience (i.e. the difference between the twins' internalising symptoms and their predicted symptoms based on cumulative stressful life events).

Method: Stressful life event exposure and internalising symptoms were assessed at two time points in 7500 adult twins. Using the residual between actual and predicted internalising symptom total score, twin modelling was conducted for each wave separately and longitudinally.

Results: Resilience was found to have a moderate genetic heritability at each wave (~31%). Qualitative gender effects were found. Incorporating error of measurement into the model increased the estimated heritability for the latent construct of resilience (~50%). When measurement error and occasion-specific effects were removed, environmental influences contributed roughly equally to level of resilience.

Conclusions: Both genes and environment influence level of psychiatric resilience, and are largely stable over time. Environmental influences can have an enduring effect on resilience.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of interest

None.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Number of stressful life events and average Symptom Checklist (SCL) total score for wave 1.
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Percent of variance (with 95% CI) accounted for from the best-fitting model for genetic and environmental factors for resilience at wave 1: female-female and male-male twins. Opposite-gender twins: genetic correlation rg = 0.38 estimated; -2 log likelihood (-2LL) = 24531.369 (d.f. = 8864), Akaike’s information criteria = 6803.369. A1, first (and only) additive genetic factor; E1, first (and only) individual-specific environmental factor.
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Percent of variance (with 95% CI) accounted for from the best-fitting model for genetic and environmental factors for resilience at waves 1 and 2. A1, additive genetic factor on the latent measure of resilience; A2, A3, additive to genetic factors for wave 1 and wave 2 respectively; E1, individual-specific environmental factor on the latent measure of resilience; E2, E3, individual-specific environmental factors for wave 1 and wave 2 resilience respectively.
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