No association between genetic variants in MAOA, OXTR, and AVPR1a and cooperative strategies
Journal
PLOS ONE
ISSN
1932-6203
Date Issued
2020
Author(s)
María I. Rivera-Hechem
Tadeo Ramírez-Parada
Type
Resource Types::text::journal::journal article
URL Institutional Repository
Abstract
<jats:p>The effort to understand the genetic basis of human sociality has been encouraged by the diversity and heritability of social traits like cooperation. This task has remained elusive largely because most studies of sociality and genetics use sample sizes that are often unable to detect the small effects that single genes may have on complex social behaviors. The lack of robust findings could also be a consequence of a poor characterization of social phenotypes. Here, we explore the latter possibility by testing whether refining measures of cooperative phenotypes can increase the replication of previously reported associations between genetic variants and cooperation in small samples. Unlike most previous studies of sociality and genetics, we characterize cooperative phenotypes based on strategies rather than actions. Measuring strategies help differentiate between similar actions with different underlaying social motivations while controlling for expectations and learning. In an admixed Latino sample (n = 188), we tested whether cooperative strategies were associated with three genetic variants thought to influence sociality in humans—<jats:italic>MAOA</jats:italic>-uVNTR, <jats:italic>OXTR</jats:italic> rs53576, and <jats:italic>AVPR1</jats:italic> RS3. We found no association between cooperative strategies and any of the candidate genetic variants. Since we were unable to replicate previous observations our results suggest that refining measurements of cooperative phenotypes as strategies is not enough to overcome the inherent statistical power problem of candidate gene studies.</jats:p>
Cite this document
Rivera-Hechem, M. I., Rodríguez-Sickert, C., Guzmán, R. A., Ramírez-Parada, T., Benavides, F., Landaeta-Torres, V., Aspé-Sánchez, M., & Repetto, G. M. (2020). No association between genetic variants in MAOA, OXTR, and AVPR1a and cooperative strategies. PLOS ONE, 15(12), e0244189. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0244189
Subjects
oxytocin receptor gene
;
by-environment interaction
;
monoamine-oxidase
;
candidate gene
;
individual-differences
;
behavior
;
polymorphism
;
trust
;
vasopressin
;
biology
;
adolescent
;
adult
;
cooperative behavior
;
female
;
games, experimental
;
genotype
;
humans
;
male
;
monoamine oxidase
;
polymorphism, genetic
;
receptors, oxytocin
;
receptors, vasopressin
;
amine oxidase (flavin containing)
;
avpr1a protein, human
;
monoamine oxidase a, human
;
oxtr protein, human
;
oxytocin receptor
;
vasopressin receptor
;
adult
;
article
;
avpr1 gene
;
avpr1a gene
;
expectation
;
female
;
gene
;
gene replication
;
genetic variability
;
hispanic
;
human
;
learning
;
male
;
maoa gene
;
maoa uvntr gene
;
motivation
;
oxtr gene
;
social behavior
;
adolescent
;
cooperation
;
game
;
genetic polymorphism
;
genetics
;
genotype