The genetic and environmental etiologies of individual differences in early reading growth in Australia, the United States, and Scandinavia

Title
The genetic and environmental etiologies of individual differences in early reading growth in Australia, the United States, and Scandinavia
Publication Date
2013
Author(s)
Christopher, Micaela E
Hulslander, Jacqueline
Byrne, Brian J
( author )
OrcID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5532-9407
Email: bbyrne@une.edu.au
UNE Id une-id:bbyrne
Samuelsson, Stefan
Keenan, Janice M
Pennington, Bruce
DeFries, John C
Wadsworth, Sally J
Willcutt, Erik
Olson, Richard K
Type of document
Journal Article
Language
en
Entity Type
Publication
Publisher
Academic Press
Place of publication
United States of America
DOI
10.1016/j.jecp.2013.03.008
UNE publication id
une:13181
Abstract
This first cross-country twin study of individual differences in reading growth from post-kindergarten to post-second grade analyzed data from 487 twin pairs from the United States, 267 twin pairs from Australia, and 280 twin pairs from Scandinavia. Data from two reading measures were fit to biometric latent growth models. Individual differences for the reading measures at post-kindergarten in the United States and Australia were due primarily to genetic influences and to both genetic and shared environmental influences in Scandinavia. In contrast, individual differences in growth generally had large genetic influences in all countries. These results suggest that genetic influences are largely responsible for individual differences in early reading development. In addition, the timing of the start of formal literacy instruction may affect the etiology of individual differences in early reading development but have only limited influence on the etiology of individual differences in growth.
Link
Citation
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 115(3), p. 453-467
ISSN
1096-0457
0022-0965
Start page
453
End page
467

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