This post, originally published 14 September, 2010, examines how genes and culture can apparently shape one another’s development and expression — a topic much in my mind as I write my book The Orchid and the Dandelion, about how genes, environment, and culture shape temperament, behavior, and destiny The Depression Map: Genes, Culture, Environment, and a […]
Continue reading →The reclamation of the “depression gene” proceeds apace: In a paper titled “Looking on the Bright Side of Serotonin Transporter Gene Variation,” two researchers who helped establish the “depression risk-gene” view of depression assert quite strongly that people with the gene variant in question — the s-allele of the serotonin transporter gene, HTTLPR — possess […]
Continue reading →Maps can tell surprising stories. About a year ago, Northwestern University psychologist Joan Chiao pondered a set of global maps that confounded conventional notions of what depression is, why we get it, and how genes — the so-called “depression gene” in particular — interact with environment and culture.
Continue reading →This isn’t something we’ll figure out in a couple workshops; it’s something the industry and the broader genomics community will need to consider carefully over the next few years, even as it rapidly grows.
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