Lucía de Hoyos, Fenja Schlag, Sanjeevan Jahagirdar, Elizabeth C Corfield, Andrea G Allegrini, Danielle Admiraal, Eveline L de Zeeuw, Ilja M Nolte, Natalia Llonga, Alexander Neumann, Katherine Lange, Simone van den Bedem, Ebba Du Rietz, Ehsan Motazedi, Else Eising, Nicole Y T Ng, Teemu Palviainen, Carol A Wang, Elisabeth Thiering, Sofia Scatolin, Priyanka Choudhary, Natalia Vilor-Tejedor, Zhijie Liao, Silvia Alemany, Casper-Emil T Pedersen, Nora Fernandez-Jimenez, Megan L Campbell, Polina Girchenko, Eli Barthome, L Caitlin Martin, Hanna Seelemeyer, Afsheen Kumar, Alexandre Jeanne, Tarunveer S Ahluwalia, Melissa H Black, Jan K Buitelaar, Simon E Fisher, Anni Heiskala, María Hernández-Lorca, Vincent W Jaddoe, Marjo-Riitta Järvelin, Sheri-Michelle Koopowitz, Marilyn T Lake, Paul Lichtenstein, Sabrina Llop, Mannan Luo, Anni Malmberg, Sergi Marí, Albertine J Oldehinkel, Zdenka Pausova, Craig E Pennell, Robert Plomin, Ted Reichborn-Kjennerud, Sheena Reilly, Alina Rodriguez, Thomas Rolland, Angelica Ronald, Katri Räikkönen, Jean Shin, María Soler Artigas, Ashley E Tate, Henning Tiemeier, Ellen Verhoef, Eero Vuoksimaa, Melissa Wake, Varun Warrier, Eivind Ystrom, Sven Bölte, Christine Ecker, Thomas Bourgeron, Jari Lahti, Dan J Stein, Jose Ramon Bilbao, Klaus Bønnelykke, Mariona Bustamante, Tomas Paus, Christel M Middeldorp, Jordi Sunyer, Sylvain Sebert, Marie Standl, Andrew J O Whitehouse, Jaakko Kaprio, J Antoni Ramos-Quiroga, Marta Ribases, Miguel Casas, Rosa Bosch, Angela T Morgan, Tanja G M Vrijkotte, Henrik Larsson, Charlotte A M Cecil, Catharina A Hartman, Dorret I Boomsma, Kaili Rimfeld, Alexandra Havdahl, Beate St Pourcain
Here, we conducted a genome-wide meta-regression meta-analysis of social behaviour from infancy to early adulthood, studying ~500,000 repeated measures in European-ancestry cohorts (N = 73,321).
Social behaviour is a heritable trait linked to well-being and mental health, yet it varies across social context, including social domains, informants and development, which may shape its underlying genomic architecture. Here, we conducted a genome-wide meta-regression meta-analysis of social behaviour from infancy to early adulthood, studying ~500,000 repeated measures in European-ancestry cohorts (N = 73,321). We modelled heterogeneity in single-variant associations across social domains (low prosocial behaviour and peer/social difficulties), multiple informants (parents, teachers and self-reports) and ages (2-29 years), identifying 6 associated loci, including variation within CADM2 (P = 2.51 × 10-9). Single nucleotide polymorphism-based heritability ranged from 2% to 7%, and the genetic architecture comprised 4 factors reflecting differences in either social domains or informants. Polygenic scores (N = 16,305) accurately predicted contextual variation in independent cohorts, with some cross-ancestry transferability. Context-specific patterns of genetic correlations, particularly when estimating the developmental onset of associations, offer opportunities to disentangle shared trajectories linking social behaviour with later-life and mental health outcomes.