Young AI., Frigge ML., Gudbjartsson DF., Thorleifsson G., Bjornsdottir G., Sulem P., Masson G., Thorsteinsdottir U., Stefansson K., Kong A.

Heritability measures the proportion of trait variation that is due to genetic inheritance. Measurement of heritability is important in the nature-versus-nurture debate. However, existing estimates of heritability may be biased by environmental effects. Here, we introduce relatedness disequilibrium regression (RDR), a novel method for estimating heritability. RDR avoids most sources of environmental bias by exploiting variation in relatedness due to random Mendelian segregation. We used a sample of 54,888 Icelanders who had both parents genotyped to estimate the heritability of 14 traits, including height (55.4%, s.e. 4.4%) and educational attainment (17.0%, s.e. 9.4%). Our results suggest that some other estimates of heritability may be inflated by environmental effects.

Relatedness disequilibrium regression estimates heritability without environmental bias.

Young AI., Frigge ML., Gudbjartsson DF., Thorleifsson G., Bjornsdottir G., Sulem P., Masson G., Thorsteinsdottir U., Stefansson K., Kong A.

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