Is it true that we are born -or not- with a talent for getting good or bad grades in school? The truth is that an international team of researchers has examined in detail the genetic material of nearly 300,000 individuals of European descent, in order to see if we are actually born with a genetic mark that predisposes us to good grades while we study.
The answer is yes, but … Scientists have discovered 9 million genetic variants that, grouped together, can have an influence or weight on school grades; Among all of them, they identified 74 genetic markers significantly related to school success, however, there is an important caveat: the influence of these genetic markers is minimal (only 3.2%) and the performance of a student alone cannot be predicted from them alone. child at school.
Genetics is not everything
Experts comment that this very low percentage of influence, 3.2%, reveals that for this reason these genetic conclusions should not be used to predict academic success or lack of it in an individual, since factors such as the educational level of the family, the attitude of the parents, the quality of education or the socioeconomic level of the family, have a great weight in this extreme.
The study has been published in the journal Nature.
