Behavioural genetics

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Behavioural genetics is the field of biology that studies the role of genetics in animal (including human) behaviour. Often associated with the idea of "Nature versus nurture", behavioural genetics is highly interdisciplinary, involving contributions from genetics, ethology, psychology, and statistics.

Behavioural geneticists study the inheritance of behavioural traits, often using the twin study or adoption study as a tool in humans, or breeding in animal genetics. While animal breeding involves genetics, and much of the material covered in behaviour genetics has been realised as needing, at least in part, genetic explanations since the founding of Evolution as a field, Behaviour genetics per-sé is considered to have been established with the publication in 1960 of Fuller and Thompson's text Behavior Genetics (Wiley, New York).

Notable behavioural geneticists include Dorret Boomsma, John DeFries, Lindon Eaves, David Fulker, John Hewitt, John Loehlin, Nick Martin, Gerald McClearn, Robert Plomin, and Theodore Reich, who was a pioneer in psychiatric genetics. Relevant journals include Genes, Brain and Behavior, Twin Research and Human Genetics, and Behavior Genetics. Other journals include outlets such as Molecular Psychiatry and Psychiatric Genetics in psychiatric genetics.

Other closely related fields include psychiatric genetics and topic-specific sub-fields.