heritability

[ljgeoff]

I've been doing a literature review the last couple of days on the heritability of several behavioral disorders - Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Conduct Disorder. Research has shown that these disorders are highly heritable, and are correlated with both poverty and prison time. The combination of ODD and ADHD are especially unhappy, with high levels of aggression, impulsivity, and lack of problem solving, planning and organizing. Several studies have shown this combination to be significantly heritable (.65 to .72)

And all this made me think of Tepper's A Gate to Women's Country.

What would a society which is trying to breed out conduct disorders look like? I suppose that depends on their methods. Mike, who has severe ADHD and dyslexia, but not ODD, has passed a measure of ADHD and dyslexia to all of his sons. And in all of them, I've seen over and over again how having people who think differently and approach a problem differently is advantageous.

If we tried to breed out these negative traits, would we be breeding out an important part of what it is to be human? And if we do nothing, if we let the status quo continue, do we doom generations of humans to prison and poverty? I don't have any answers, but I'm intrigued with the questions. If the next hundred years is a crucible for our race, I wonder what will come out of the fire.

Comments

[lovecraftienne.livejournal.com]

I loved AGtWC. It gave me the immigration metaphor I'd been seeking, and which I've claimed. I like formative books. :)

[firecat]

I assume you've seen the movie Gattaca?

[ljgeoff.livejournal.com]

There are an awful lot of movies that I haven't seen, and this is one of them. I remember hearing about it, but it passed under my radar. Looks interesting, though - maybe I'll pick it up this weekend.

[anansi133.livejournal.com]

So, what does the literature say about the heretability of social class?

I'm not really kidding here: the hole in our language about social class keeps trying to be filled by psychological munmbo-jumbo.

[ljgeoff.livejournal.com]

It only notes a correlation between low socioeconomic status and behavioral problems, not causation. However, the research does show significant heritability in ODD, CD and ADHD.

What I've seen while talking to clients at the center is generations of mood disorder, conduct disorder and substance abuse; generations of child abuse and spouse abuse; generations of poverty, unaddressed health issues and low education expectations.

What can you say to an intelligent, 40-yr old woman who was raped by her uncles, lived on the street, drugged herself so she wouldn't feel, gave birth to three children who where, in turn, abused and neglected? She cried while she told me that her daughter was raped by her boyfriend while she was passed out.

And so it goes. Generation after generation.

I think that it's a lot of things. The poor are of great advantage to our society and our society works to keep us in place. Drugs are readily available. Laws are discriminatory. Schools are discriminatory. And in a natural progression, low-valued heritable traits are over-represented in the poor -- low status potential mates will mostly be desirable to other low status mates. Added to that, individuals born into whatever class will be encouraged by society to remain in that class, whatever their personality, traits or abilities. Social class is a reality that Americans don't like to consider, eh?

Myself, I'm intelligent and creative; I assume that I've always been so and that this isn't a recent expression. And yet it's taken me most of my adult life to stop beating my head against brick walls, get a college education and live with meaning. I don't think anyone sets out to not succeed, so what is it that kept me at the emotional level of a teenager for an additional ten years? And why didn't I stay that way? Was it a biological change, a spiritual awakening, or being arrested one too many times? And, again, for me, what difference will it make if I ever figure it out? Will I be able to use the information to help some other find their way? Or will I simply be subsumed by my fascination of navel gazing?

[anansi133.livejournal.com]

I'm trying to point to a larger center of cognitive dissonance, where the best educated scientific minds in the world are actively collaborating with each other to show us all that they represent the best we can possibly hope for.

One logical beginning point for this story, was in furious debate between Lamarkism- heribility of aquired traits- and Darwinism- constant winnowing out of the bad stuff.

It's interesting that while social darwinism has a long and checkered political history, social lamarkism (which I find much more plausible) is unheard of.

It's now commonly accepted as factual that the build, the eyesight, the intelligence, et al that you inherit from your parents are going to impact your future, for better or for worse. But the idea that the social class you inherit from your parents might also have something to do with your future path... that doesn't get much ink at all, for some strange reason. Bill Gates is hailed as a self-made man, who dropped out of school because his genius couldn't be contained. The grooming he got from his banker parents just doesn't make as compelling a story.

[OK, enough ranting. I should probably try to actually respond to what you've said]

It's a trivial thing to say that someone's inherited ADD, ODC, Bipolar, whatever has held that person back in the world. Yet people with more money can afford to get by without even being diagnosed. They can avoid the social stigma by making up for the lack using their money, and the statistical databses simply note that rich people don't seem as fucked up as poor people. Hardly surprising, is it?

When I've come out of the hospital from a psychotic break, I notice just how many sharp edges the world seems to have, and how easy it is to get broken all over again. Yet when I inherited that money from Dad, I noticed how many of those sharp edges just seemed to melt away. I didn't need to track as many variables, so I didn't feel nearly as ADD as before. Nothing had changed but my income, yet I was suddenly much more functional.


This world didn't just happen, it was made by people, and people with money have had a much larger voice in designing this world than those without. Yet there's nothing to say a simple village lifestyle with a modest little income can't sustain a healthy group of families. It takes constant jostling from outside to make us feel like we want to bring more of the big bad city into our lives.

For the first time, the global trend toward city life is beginning to reverse itself. People are going back the the villages from the city, because there's more opportunity now in the fields where the food is, than the scrambling bustle of too much labor seeking too few jobs.

Actually, I think you may have an advantage where you live, over where I live, just because the climate and the environment have kept traditions of life support a little closer to mind. Here in the deep suburbs we've forgotten where food comes from.

As worried as I am encouraged to be about political collapse, I still believe that the financial meltdown is a huge opprotunity for people's lives to get better.

[ljgeoff.livejournal.com]

Oh, man. Yes, I see your point. How subjective is the assessment? Babe, you do this to me every time. Thank you.

Would it be ok if I quoted your words to my psych class?

[anansi133.livejournal.com]

Heh. Go ahead! I'll be curious to hear how it's received.

Better, though, if you can use your own words, because then you'll be in a better position to defend the idea.