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SUMMARY:What does the high heritability of psychological traits mean for p
 sychologists and educators? - Prof Michael Thomas\, Birkbeck\, University 
 of London
DTSTART:20251128T163000Z
DTEND:20251128T180000Z
UID:TALK237187@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Psychology Reception
DESCRIPTION:Behavioural genetics has a hundred-year history of pointing to
  the high heritability of psychological traits relevant to people’s ever
 yday lives\, and outcomes such as educational attainment linked to wellbei
 ng and professional success. Recently\, the availability of polygenic indi
 ces\, derived from large-scale genomic studies\, has brought behavioural g
 enetics to the individual level\, generating individualised predictions of
  genetic potential. This advance brings into focus the relevance of genomi
 c information for both personal and policy decisions. The drawbacks of beh
 avioural genetics are twofold: it tells us only about current population o
 utcomes\, not how they could be different under different circumstances\; 
 and it is relatively silent on the developmental mechanisms that deliver h
 eritable outcomes. In this talk\, I will use a computational framework to 
 focus on developmental mechanisms. I will show how simulations of interven
 tions to alter developmental outcomes for whole populations\, which have b
 een designed to show differing levels of trait heritability\, can produce 
 surprising results. These results point to the policy relevance of the not
 ion of heritability itself.\n\nHost: Prof Dénes Szücs (ds377@cam.ac.uk)\
 n\nThis talk will be recorded and uploaded to the Zangwill Club "Youtube c
 hannel":https://www.youtube.com/@zangwillclub5226 in due course.
LOCATION:Ground Floor Lecture Theatre\, Department of  Psychology
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