“Meta-Analysis of Twin Studies Highlights the Importance of Genetic Variation in Primary School Educational Achievement”, Eveline L. de Zeeuw, Eco J. C. de Geus, Dorret I. Boomsma2015-09 ()⁠:

Children differ in their ability to learn what is taught at school. Evidence from twin studies suggests that genetic effects contribute to such differences.

The aim of the present study was to systematically review the existing literature, including 61 studies from 11 cohorts, on twin studies of educational achievement in primary school children. The meta-analysis estimated heritability, based on up to 5,330 MZ and 7,084 DZ twin pairs, at:

73% for reading, 49% for reading comprehension, 57% for mathematics, 44% for spelling, 64% for language and 66% for educational achievement. The importance of genetic effects on educational achievement differed between countries. Heritability was consistently high in the Netherlands across educational domains, while this was not always true for the USA and the UK.

It can be concluded that genetic variation is an important contributor to the individual differences in educational achievement, with some indication for interaction with country.

[keywords: educational achievement, genetic variation, heritability, twins, primary education]

Figure 1: Heritability estimates (95% confidence intervals) for each study, by country and overall, as estimated in the meta-analysis and based on the reported twin correlations and sample sizes for reading (A), reading comprehension (B), mathematics (C), language (D), spelling (E) and educational achievement (F).

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Meta-Analysis of Twin Studies Highlights the Importance of Genetic Variation in Primary School Educational Achievement