Genetic and environmental influences on adult human height across birth cohorts from 1886 to 1994

Aline Jelenkovic^{1

2}, Yoon-Mi Hur³, Reijo Sund¹, Yoshie Yokoyama⁴, Sisira H Siribaddana^{5

6}, Matthew Hotopf⁷, Athula Sumathipala^{5

8}, Fruhling Rijsdijk⁹, Qihua Tan¹⁰, Dongfeng Zhang¹¹, Zengchang Pang¹², Sari Aaltonen^{1

13}, Kauko Heikkilä¹³, Sevgi Y Öncel¹⁴, Fazil Aliev^{15

16

17}, Esther Rebato², Adam D Tarnoki^{18

19}, David L Tarnoki^{18

19}, Kaare Christensen^{20

21

22

23}, Axel Skytthe^{20

21}, Kirsten O Kyvik^{24

25}, Judy L Silberg²⁶, Lindon J Eaves²⁶, Hermine H Maes²⁷, Tessa L Cutler²⁸, John L Hopper^{28

29}, Juan R Ordoñana^{30

31}, Juan F Sánchez-Romera^{31

32}, Lucia Colodro-Conde^{30

33}, Wendy Cozen^{34

35}, Amie E Hwang³⁴, Thomas M Mack^{34

35}, Joohon Sung^{29

36}, Yun-Mi Song³⁷, Sarah Yang^{29

36}, Kayoung Lee³⁸, Carol E Franz³⁹, William S Kremen^{39

40}, Michael J Lyons⁴¹, Andreas Busjahn⁴², Tracy L Nelson⁴³, Keith E Whitfield⁴⁴, Christian Kandler⁴⁵, Kerry L Jang⁴⁶, Margaret Gatz^{47

48}, David A Butler⁴⁹, Maria A Stazi⁵⁰, Corrado Fagnani⁵⁰, Cristina D'Ippolito⁵⁰, Glen E Duncan⁵¹, Dedra Buchwald⁵², Catherine A Derom^{53

54}, Robert F Vlietinck⁵³, Ruth Jf Loos^{55

56}, Nicholas G Martin⁵⁷, Sarah E Medland⁵⁷, Grant W Montgomery⁵⁸, Hoe-Uk Jeong³, Gary E Swan⁵⁹, Ruth Krasnow⁶⁰, Patrik Ke Magnusson⁴⁸, Nancy L Pedersen⁴⁸, Anna K Dahl-Aslan^{48

61}, Tom A McAdams⁹, Thalia C Eley⁹, Alice M Gregory⁶², Per Tynelius⁶³, Laura A Baker⁴⁷, Catherine Tuvblad^{47

64}, Gombojav Bayasgalan⁶⁵, Danshiitsoodol Narandalai^{65

66}, Paul Lichtenstein⁴⁸, Timothy D Spector⁶⁷, Massimo Mangino⁶⁷, Genevieve Lachance⁶⁷, Meike Bartels⁶⁸, Toos Cem van Beijsterveldt⁶⁸, Gonneke Willemsen⁶⁸, S Alexandra Burt⁶⁹, Kelly L Klump⁶⁹, Jennifer R Harris⁷⁰, Ingunn Brandt⁷⁰, Thomas Sevenius Nilsen⁷⁰, Robert F Krueger⁷¹, Matt McGue⁷¹, Shandell Pahlen⁷¹, Robin P Corley⁷², Jacob V B Hjelmborg^{20

21}, Jack H Goldberg⁷³, Yoshinori Iwatani⁷⁴, Mikio Watanabe⁷⁴, Chika Honda⁷⁴, Fujio Inui^{74

75}, Finn Rasmussen⁶³, Brooke M Huibregtse⁷², Dorret I Boomsma⁶⁸, Thorkild I A Sørensen^{76

77

78}, Jaakko Kaprio^{13

79}, Karri Silventoinen^{1

74}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Social Research, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
² Department of Genetics, Physical Anthropology and Animal Physiology, University of the Basque Country, Leioa, Spain.
³ Department of Education, Mokpo National University, Jeonnam, South Korea.
⁴ Department of Public Health Nursing, Osaka City University, Osaka, Japan.
⁵ Institute of Research & Development, Battaramulla, Sri Lanka.
⁶ Faculty of Medicine & Allied Sciences, Rajarata University of Sri Lanka, Saliyapura, Sri Lanka.
⁷ NIHR Mental Health Biomedical Research Centre, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and, Institute of Psychiatry Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
⁸ Research Institute for Primary Care and Health Sciences, School for Primary Care Research, Faculty of Health, Keele University, Staffordshire, United Kingdom.
⁹ MRC Social, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
¹⁰ Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Biodemography, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
¹¹ Department of Public Health, Qingdao University Medical College, Qingdao, China.
¹² Department of Noncommunicable Diseases Prevention, Qingdao Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Qingdao, China.
¹³ Department of Public Health, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
¹⁴ Department of Statistics, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Kirikkale University, Kirikkale, Turkey.
¹⁵ Faculty of Business, Karabuk University, Karabuk, Turkey.
¹⁶ Department of Psychology, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, United States.
¹⁷ Department of African American Studies, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, United States.
¹⁸ Department of Radiology and Oncotherapy, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary.
¹⁹ Hungarian Twin Registry, Budapest, Hungary.
²⁰ The Danish Twin Registry, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²¹ Department of Public Health, Epidemiology, Biostatistics & Biodemography, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²² Department of Clinical Biochemistry and Pharmacology, Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²³ Department of Clinical Genetics, Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²⁴ Department of Clinical Research, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²⁵ Odense Patient data Explorative Network (OPEN), Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²⁶ Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, United States.
²⁷ Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Psychiatry & Massey Cancer Center, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, United States.
²⁸ The Australian Twin Registry, Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.
²⁹ Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.
³⁰ Department of Human Anatomy and Psychobiology, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain.
³¹ IMIB-Arrixaca, Murcia, Spain.
³² Department of Developmental and Educational Psychology, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain.
³³ QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
³⁴ Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, United States.
³⁵ USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, Los Angeles, United States.
³⁶ Institute of Health and Environment, Seoul National University, Seoul, South-Korea.
³⁷ Department of Family Medicine, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Seoul, South-Korea.
³⁸ Department of Family Medicine, Busan Paik Hospital, Inje University College of Medicine, Busan, Korea.
³⁹ Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, San Diego, United States.
⁴⁰ VA San Diego Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, La Jolla, CA, United States.
⁴¹ Department of Psychology, Boston University, Boston, United States.
⁴² HealthTwiSt GmbH, Berlin, Germany.
⁴³ Department of Health and Exercise Sciences and Colorado School of Public Health, Colorado State University, Colorado, United States.
⁴⁴ Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, United States.
⁴⁵ Department of Psychology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
⁴⁶ Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
⁴⁷ Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, United States.
⁴⁸ Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁴⁹ Health and Medicine Division, The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, United States.
⁵⁰ Istituto Superiore di Sanità - National Center for Epidemiology, Surveillance and Health Promotion, Rome, Italy.
⁵¹ Washington State Twin Registry, Washington State University - Health Sciences Spokane, Spokane, United States.
⁵² Washington State Twin Registry, Washington State University, Seattle, United States.
⁵³ Centre of Human Genetics, University Hospitals Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
⁵⁴ Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Ghent University Hospitals, Ghent, Belgium.
⁵⁵ The Charles Bronfman Institute for Personalized Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, United States.
⁵⁶ The Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, United States.
⁵⁷ Genetic Epidemiology Department, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
⁵⁸ Molecular Epidemiology Department, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
⁵⁹ Stanford Prevention Research Center, Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, United States.
⁶⁰ Center for Health Sciences, SRI International, Menlo Park, United States.
⁶¹ Institute of Gerontology and Aging Research Network - Jönköping (ARN-J), School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden.
⁶² Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, London, United Kingdom.
⁶³ Department of Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁶⁴ School of Law, Psychology and Social Work, Örebro University, Örebro, Sweden.
⁶⁵ Healthy Twin Association of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
⁶⁶ Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan.
⁶⁷ Department of Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology, King's College, London, United Kingdom.
⁶⁸ Department of Biological Psychology, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
⁶⁹ Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, United States.
⁷⁰ Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo, Norway.
⁷¹ Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, United States.
⁷² Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado, Boulder, United States.
⁷³ Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of Washington, Seattle, United States.
⁷⁴ Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan.
⁷⁵ Faculty of Health Science, Kio University, Nara, Japan.
⁷⁶ Novo Nordisk Foundation Centre for Basic Metabolic Research (Section on Metabolic Genetics), University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁷ Department of Public Health, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁸ Institute of Preventive Medicine, Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospitals, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁹ Institute for Molecular Medicine FIMM, Helsinki, Finland.

PMID: 27964777
PMCID: PMC5156525
DOI: 10.7554/eLife.20320

Genetic and environmental influences on adult human height across birth cohorts from 1886 to 1994

Aline Jelenkovic et al. Elife. 2016.

. 2016 Dec 14:5:e20320.

doi: 10.7554/eLife.20320.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Department of Social Research, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
² Department of Genetics, Physical Anthropology and Animal Physiology, University of the Basque Country, Leioa, Spain.
³ Department of Education, Mokpo National University, Jeonnam, South Korea.
⁴ Department of Public Health Nursing, Osaka City University, Osaka, Japan.
⁵ Institute of Research & Development, Battaramulla, Sri Lanka.
⁶ Faculty of Medicine & Allied Sciences, Rajarata University of Sri Lanka, Saliyapura, Sri Lanka.
⁷ NIHR Mental Health Biomedical Research Centre, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust and, Institute of Psychiatry Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
⁸ Research Institute for Primary Care and Health Sciences, School for Primary Care Research, Faculty of Health, Keele University, Staffordshire, United Kingdom.
⁹ MRC Social, Genetic & Developmental Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
¹⁰ Epidemiology, Biostatistics and Biodemography, Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
¹¹ Department of Public Health, Qingdao University Medical College, Qingdao, China.
¹² Department of Noncommunicable Diseases Prevention, Qingdao Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Qingdao, China.
¹³ Department of Public Health, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland.
¹⁴ Department of Statistics, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Kirikkale University, Kirikkale, Turkey.
¹⁵ Faculty of Business, Karabuk University, Karabuk, Turkey.
¹⁶ Department of Psychology, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, United States.
¹⁷ Department of African American Studies, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, United States.
¹⁸ Department of Radiology and Oncotherapy, Semmelweis University, Budapest, Hungary.
¹⁹ Hungarian Twin Registry, Budapest, Hungary.
²⁰ The Danish Twin Registry, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²¹ Department of Public Health, Epidemiology, Biostatistics & Biodemography, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²² Department of Clinical Biochemistry and Pharmacology, Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²³ Department of Clinical Genetics, Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²⁴ Department of Clinical Research, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark.
²⁵ Odense Patient data Explorative Network (OPEN), Odense University Hospital, Odense, Denmark.
²⁶ Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, United States.
²⁷ Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Psychiatry & Massey Cancer Center, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, United States.
²⁸ The Australian Twin Registry, Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia.
²⁹ Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea.
³⁰ Department of Human Anatomy and Psychobiology, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain.
³¹ IMIB-Arrixaca, Murcia, Spain.
³² Department of Developmental and Educational Psychology, University of Murcia, Murcia, Spain.
³³ QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
³⁴ Department of Preventive Medicine, Keck School of Medicine of USC, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, United States.
³⁵ USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, Los Angeles, United States.
³⁶ Institute of Health and Environment, Seoul National University, Seoul, South-Korea.
³⁷ Department of Family Medicine, Samsung Medical Center, Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, Seoul, South-Korea.
³⁸ Department of Family Medicine, Busan Paik Hospital, Inje University College of Medicine, Busan, Korea.
³⁹ Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, San Diego, United States.
⁴⁰ VA San Diego Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, La Jolla, CA, United States.
⁴¹ Department of Psychology, Boston University, Boston, United States.
⁴² HealthTwiSt GmbH, Berlin, Germany.
⁴³ Department of Health and Exercise Sciences and Colorado School of Public Health, Colorado State University, Colorado, United States.
⁴⁴ Psychology and Neuroscience, Duke University, Durham, United States.
⁴⁵ Department of Psychology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany.
⁴⁶ Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada.
⁴⁷ Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, United States.
⁴⁸ Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁴⁹ Health and Medicine Division, The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, United States.
⁵⁰ Istituto Superiore di Sanità - National Center for Epidemiology, Surveillance and Health Promotion, Rome, Italy.
⁵¹ Washington State Twin Registry, Washington State University - Health Sciences Spokane, Spokane, United States.
⁵² Washington State Twin Registry, Washington State University, Seattle, United States.
⁵³ Centre of Human Genetics, University Hospitals Leuven, Leuven, Belgium.
⁵⁴ Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Ghent University Hospitals, Ghent, Belgium.
⁵⁵ The Charles Bronfman Institute for Personalized Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, United States.
⁵⁶ The Mindich Child Health and Development Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, United States.
⁵⁷ Genetic Epidemiology Department, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
⁵⁸ Molecular Epidemiology Department, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia.
⁵⁹ Stanford Prevention Research Center, Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, United States.
⁶⁰ Center for Health Sciences, SRI International, Menlo Park, United States.
⁶¹ Institute of Gerontology and Aging Research Network - Jönköping (ARN-J), School of Health and Welfare, Jönköping University, Jönköping, Sweden.
⁶² Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, London, United Kingdom.
⁶³ Department of Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
⁶⁴ School of Law, Psychology and Social Work, Örebro University, Örebro, Sweden.
⁶⁵ Healthy Twin Association of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.
⁶⁶ Graduate School of Biomedical and Health Sciences, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan.
⁶⁷ Department of Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology, King's College, London, United Kingdom.
⁶⁸ Department of Biological Psychology, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
⁶⁹ Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, United States.
⁷⁰ Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo, Norway.
⁷¹ Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, United States.
⁷² Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado, Boulder, United States.
⁷³ Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of Washington, Seattle, United States.
⁷⁴ Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan.
⁷⁵ Faculty of Health Science, Kio University, Nara, Japan.
⁷⁶ Novo Nordisk Foundation Centre for Basic Metabolic Research (Section on Metabolic Genetics), University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁷ Department of Public Health, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁸ Institute of Preventive Medicine, Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospitals, Copenhagen, Denmark.
⁷⁹ Institute for Molecular Medicine FIMM, Helsinki, Finland.

PMID: 27964777
PMCID: PMC5156525
DOI: 10.7554/eLife.20320

Abstract

Human height variation is determined by genetic and environmental factors, but it remains unclear whether their influences differ across birth-year cohorts. We conducted an individual-based pooled analysis of 40 twin cohorts including 143,390 complete twin pairs born 1886-1994. Although genetic variance showed a generally increasing trend across the birth-year cohorts, heritability estimates (0.69-0.84 in men and 0.53-0.78 in women) did not present any clear pattern of secular changes. Comparing geographic-cultural regions (Europe, North America and Australia, and East Asia), total height variance was greatest in North America and Australia and lowest in East Asia, but no clear pattern in the heritability estimates across the birth-year cohorts emerged. Our findings do not support the hypothesis that heritability of height is lower in populations with low living standards than in affluent populations, nor that heritability of height will increase within a population as living standards improve.

Keywords: CODATwins project; birth cohorts; height; heritability; human; human biology; medicine; twins.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

Figures

**Figure 1.. Additive genetic (grey), shared environmental (black) and unique environmental (white) variances of height across birth-year cohorts for the pooled data and by geographic-cultural region.**
**DOI:** http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.20320.003

See this image and copyright information in PMC

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Genetic and environmental influences on adult human height across birth cohorts from 1886 to 1994

Affiliations

Genetic and environmental influences on adult human height across birth cohorts from 1886 to 1994

Authors

Affiliations

Abstract

Conflict of interest statement

Figures

References

Publication types

MeSH terms

Grants and funding

LinkOut - more resources

Full Text Sources

Other Literature Sources