Disentangling genetic and environmental influences on early language development: The interplay of genetic propensity for negative emotionality and surgency, and parenting behavior effects on early language skills in an adoption study

Parenting and children's temperament are important influences on language development. However, temperament may reflect prior parenting, and parenting effects may reflect genes common to parents and children. In 561 U.S. adoptees (57% male) and their birth and rearing parents (70% and 92% White, 13% and 4% African American, and 7% and 2% Latinx, respectively), this study demonstrated how genetic propensity for temperament affects language development, and how this relates to parenting. Genetic propensity for negative emotionality inversely predicted language at 27 months (β = -.15) and evoked greater maternal warmth (β = .12), whereas propensity for surgency positively predicted language at 4.5 years (β = .20), especially when warmth was low. Parental warmth (β = .15) and sensitivity (β = .19) further contributed to language development, controlling for common gene effects.

The Detection of Environmental Influences on Academic Achievement Appears to Depend on the Analytic Approach

One long-standing analytic approach in adoption studies is to examine correlations between features of adoptive homes and outcomes of adopted children (hereafter termed 'measured environment correlations') to illuminate environmental influences on those associations. Although results from such studies have almost uniformly suggested modest environmental influences on adopted children's academic achievement, other work has indicated that adopted children's achievement is routinely higher than that of their reared-apart family members, often substantially so. We sought to understand this discrepancy. We examined academic achievement and literacy-promotive features of the home in 424 yoked adoptive/biological families participating in the Early Growth and Development Study (EGDS; i.e., adopted children, adoptive mothers, birth mothers, and biological siblings of the adopted children remaining in the birth homes) using an exhaustive modeling approach. Results indicated that, as anticipated, adopted children scored up to a full standard deviation higher on standardized achievement tests relative to their birth mothers and reared-apart biological siblings. Moreover, these achievement differences were associated with differences in the literacy-promotive features of the adoptive and birth family homes, despite minimal measured environment correlations within adoptive families. A subsequent simulation study highlighted noise in measured environmental variables as an explanation for the decreased utility of measured environment correlations. We conclude that the field's heavy focus on measured environment correlations within adoptive families may have obscured detection of specific environmental effects on youth outcomes, and that future adoption studies should supplement their measured environment analyses with mean differences between reared-apart relatives.

Associations of Duration of Preadoption Out-of-home Care, Genetic Risk for Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders and Adoptive Family Functioning with Later Psychiatric Disorders of Adoptees

The objective was to examine the impacts of duration of preadoption out-of-home care and adoptive family functioning on later psychiatric morbidity of adoptees with high (HR) and low (LR) genetic risk for schizophrenia spectrum disorders. The study uses nationwide data from the Finnish Adoptive Family Study of Schizophrenia. The study population in this substudy consisted of 43 h adoptees and 128 LR adoptees. Of these adoptees, 90 had spent 0-6 months and 81 over 6 months in preadoption out-of-home care. The family functioning of adoptive families was assessed based on Global Family Ratings and psychiatric disorders on DSM-III-R criteria. The results showed that among the adoptees with over 6 months in preadoption out-of-home care, the likelihood for psychiatric disorders was significantly increased in HR adoptees compared to LR adoptees. In adoptees with 6 months or less in preadoption out-of-home care, an increased likelihood for psychiatric disorders was found among those living in adoptive families with dysfunctional processes. These findings indicate that especially for HR children, a well-functioning early caregiving environment is crucial in terms of subsequent mental wellbeing. The results emphasize that when adoption is necessary, early placement and well-functioning adoptive family environment are beneficial to children.

Female Chinese transracial adoptees' racial awakening amid dual racial pandemics

OBJECTIVES

2020 was marked by two racial pandemics-COVID-19-related attacks against Asians and the police brutality against Blacks that spurred the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement-calling attention to racial privilege and oppression in American society. The present study explores female Chinese transracial adoptees' unique lived experiences during this racially salient moment.

METHOD

A phenomenological approach captured how 20 female Chinese transracial adoptees navigated and made sense of the dual racial pandemics and the subsequent impact on their racial awareness, identity development, and advocacy. Data were collected using semistructured individual Zoom interviews and coded using phenomenological analysis.

RESULTS

Findings suggest the dual pandemics acted as catalysts for female Chinese transracial adoptees' racial consciousness and reevaluation of their positionality within the racial hierarchy. Three core themes emerged: female transracial adoptees' new self-understanding as racial beings; their perspective on their place within the White-Black dichotomy; and their role in promoting racial justice.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings contribute to the literature by highlighting the complexities of female Chinese transracial adoptees' racialized selves as children of color who have been raised in White families; their motivations to foster racial justice; and their ability to facilitate race talk. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Having children in cross-border contexts: late-family formation among homoparental families in Spain

Considered until recently unfit to rear children, non-heterosexual people have been excluded from forming families in most countries. Many, worldwide, demand access to family formation, claiming the same aptitudes as heterosexual people for raising children. However, when non-heterosexual singles and couples want to become parents in Spain, they must consider transnational contexts, resorting to inter-country adoption or surrogacy abroad, processes that contribute to delay their family formation. They must consider not only Spanish sociocultural conditions, but other countries' legal restrictions regarding parents' gender, social status, and sexual identity. These families experience great difficulty in gaining access to reproductive health services. Based on multi-site ethnographic fieldwork, this text addresses how, despite legislative changes allowing homoparental family formation in Spain, these parents must overcome complex bureaucratic processes when they decide to have children, while facing homophobic attitudes and policies in their quests to become parents.

When disability and homoparenting meet: the adoption of children with disability by same sex couples

The present theoretical essay is based on six reports concerning same-sex couples and gay and lesbian people in order to interconnect homoparenting and the adoption of children with disabilities, through the lenses of human and social sciences in public health. The reports were interpreted in light of studies on same-sex adoption and the adoption of children with disabilities. Feminist approaches related to care and disability were also included in the interpretative perspective, operating as expressive webs of grammars of ableism. It was found that media approaches endorse the right to family formation and the adoption of children with disabilities by homoparental families, but with little critical depth on the category of disability and without highlighting support for the adoption of all adoptee profiles. Moreover, the intersections between homophobia and ableism increase discriminatory and oppressive logics, with the union of social groups considered to be "undesirable" representing a strategy of governmentality that reveals the complexity of grammars of ableism, applied to the sexual and reproductive rights of LGBTQIA+ adopters and to the fundamental rights of children and adolescents with disabilities who are available for adoption.

National training and development curriculum training program impact on placement, permanency, and stability

BACKGROUND

Resource parent trainings are an important factor in caregiver readiness and retention, which can improve placement stability and permanency achievement for children and youth, especially those who are marginalized.

OBJECTIVE

Resource parents need access to evidence-based training programs attentive to caring for children and youth from a variety of diverse backgrounds. This study evaluates placement, permanency, and stability outcomes of children whose resource parents were trained in one such program: the National Training and Development Curriculum (NTDC).

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

Participants include adults who completed a resource parent training program (N = 3822) and children in their care (N = 2565) in the U.S. states of Florida, Georgia, Illinois, and Missouri.

METHODS

This quasi-experimental study involved statistical testing of caregivers and children using AFCARS data. Propensity-score matching was used to control for differences in the child permanency analysis.

RESULTS

With a better understanding of the realities of fostering, NTDC participants were slightly less likely to foster after training (OR = 0.6; p < .001), self-selecting out before taking a child into the home. Those who did foster were more likely to foster a child who is a teen (OR = 1.4; p = .004), Asian/Asian American (OR = 3.8; p = .02), Black/African American (OR = 1.6; p < .001), or Hispanic/Latinx (OR = 1.7; p = .002). Children of NTDC caregivers entered legal adoptions (OR = 2.0; p = .003) and guardianships (OR = 2.9; p = .03) at higher rates than children of comparison caregivers, while rates of reunification (OR = 1.3; p = .11) were not statistically different.

CONCLUSIONS

Evidence points to the effectiveness of NTDC in preparing resource parents to provide care for a diverse range of children by age, race, and ethnicity, and for those children to achieve permanency.

The Placement of Children in Need of Out-of-Home Care: Forms of Care and Differences in Attachment Security and Behavioral Problems in the Italian Context

The current paper investigated differences in secure attachment levels and behavioral problems among four groups of children in out-of-home care in Italy: closed adoption (child and birth parents not in contact following adoption), open adoption (child and birth parents still in contact after placement), foster care (child living temporarily with relatives or unrelated foster parents) and institutional care (child in residential care for large groups of children). One hundred and thirty children aged 10-19 were included in this study. The Attachment Interview for Childhood and Adolescence and the Achenbach Youth Self-Report were employed to measure participants' secure attachment levels and behavioral problems. Both a multivariate analysis of covariance and measured variable path analysis were performed. Age, gender and time elapsed between the request for child protection and placement on out-of-home care were used as covariates. The results showed that adolescents in closed adoption had higher secure attachment scores than those in foster care and institutional care, while adolescents in open adoption scored significantly higher on problem behaviors than those in the other out-of-home care groups. Findings were discussed in terms of limitations and implications for future research.

Orphans cannot be after-birth aborted: a response to Bobier

I offer a response to an objection to my account of the moral difference between fetuses and newborns, an account that seeks to address an analogy between abortion and infanticide, which is based on the apparent equality of moral value of fetuses and newborns.

Facial emotion recognition in adopted children

Children adopted from public care are more likely to experience emotional and behavioural problems. We investigated two aspects of emotion recognition that may be associated with these outcomes, including discrimination accuracy of emotions and response bias, in a mixed-method, multi-informant study of 4-to-8-year old children adopted from local authority care in the UK (N = 42). We compared adopted children's emotion recognition performance to that of a comparison group of children living with their birth families, who were matched by age, sex, and teacher-rated total difficulties on the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ, N = 42). We also examined relationships between adopted children's emotion recognition skills and their pre-adoptive histories of early adversity (indexed by cumulative adverse childhood experiences), their parent- and teacher-rated emotional and behavioural problems, and their parents' coded warmth during a Five Minute Speech Sample. Adopted children showed significantly worse facial emotion discrimination accuracy of sad and angry faces than non-adopted children. Adopted children's discrimination accuracy of scared and neutral faces was negatively associated with parent-reported behavioural problems, and discrimination accuracy of angry and scared faces was associated with parent- and teacher-reported emotional problems. Contrary to expectations, children who experienced more recorded pre-adoptive early adversity were more accurate in identifying negative emotions. Warm adoptive parenting was associated with fewer behavioural problems, and a lower tendency for children to incorrectly identify faces as angry. Study limitations and implications for intervention strategies to support adopted children's emotion recognition and psychological adjustment are discussed.

"Failed" Matches, Child Removals, and Disrupted Placements: Devastating and Invisible Losses During the Family-Building Journey for LGBTQ Adoptive Parents

Reproductive loss, which includes miscarriage and nongestational loss, such as adoption loss, is rarely recognized as part of the family-building journey. Such loss tends to be even more invisible among LGBTQ individuals. The current study examines the experiences of 80 LGBTQ individuals who experienced adoption-related losses (i.e., failed adoption matches, child removals, disrupted child placements), with attention to how these losses impacted them and what enabled them to move forward. Participants who pursued private domestic adoption experienced failed matches (i.e., birth parents deciding to parent or choosing another family) both before (n = 21) and/or after (n = 24) a child was born. Participants who pursued public domestic adoption experienced child removals involving reunification with birth parents (n = 14) and other birth relatives (n = 18), as well as disrupted placements initiated by parents (n = 10) and children (n = 7). Failed matches, child removals, and disrupted placements were typically experienced as "crushing" and invisible losses. They were often followed by a period of grieving, and sometimes prompted adjustments to the type of matches or placements participants would consider (e.g., to mitigate the likelihood of future similar losses). Moving forward from adoption losses was facilitated by support from partners and those who experienced similar losses, knowledge or hope regarding the children once in their care, and finally being placed with the child(ren) whom they ultimately legally adopted.

"Forever family is like a manufactured Hallmark idea": Adoption discontinuity experiences of intercountry adoptees

BACKGROUND

Media stories over the past decade have sensationalized cases of intercountry adoption discontinuity, a phenomenon largely missing from the research literature.

OBJECTIVE

This study sought to understand how intercountry adoptees with adoption discontinuity histories experience legal, relational, and residential permanency losses through the framework of ambiguous loss and trauma.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

Twenty intercountry adoptees in the United States who experienced adoption discontinuity as minor children.

METHODS

Participants were recruited through social media sites and professional and informal organizations serving intercountry adoptees.

RESULTS

Participants described multiple experiences with legal, residential, and relational permanency losses often in multiple combinations, multiple times, and in multiple settings. Participants also experienced racial, ethnic and cultural identity losses in addition to their permanency ruptures.

CONCLUSION

More research on the lived experiences of intercountry adoptees with adoption discontinuity histories is needed. Adoptees experience trauma in their pre-adoptive histories as well as in the adoption process itself and need adoptive parents skilled in trauma-informed parenting. In addition, there is a need for robust trauma-informed support for adoptees throughout their lifetime.

Emotional-behavioral problems, attachment and verbal skills in late-adopted adolescents: The role of pre-adoption adversities and adoption variables

BACKGROUND

There are few studies on late-adopted adolescents' outcomes -e.g., emotional-behavioral problems, attachment and cognitive status- and their possible predictive factors, none from Italy.

OBJECTIVE

This paper aimed to investigate emotional-behavioral problems, attachment representations, and verbal skills in late-adopted adolescents in Italy and to explore the predictive role of pre-adoption adversities and adoption variables for worse adoptees' outcomes.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

The study included N = 79 late-adopted (mean age at adoption = 6 years) adolescents, between 11 and 18 years, placed via both intercountry and domestic adoption.

METHODS

Parents provided information about pre-adoption and adoption history and filled the Children's Behavior Checklist 6-18 for measuring participants' emotional-behavioral problems. Attachment representations were assessed through the Friend and Family Interview administered directly to adolescents, like the verbal comprehension index of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (4th edition) for measuring participants' verbal IQ.

RESULTS

Maltreatment and its interaction with multiple placements were the main predictors of other problems-i.e., social, thought, and identity difficulties (respectively, p = .007 and p = .029)-while intercountry adoption was the unique predictor of both externalizing and total problems (respectively, p = .047 and p = .015). However, domestic adoption was the most important predictor both for higher insecurity and disorganized attachment representations and lower verbal skills (all p < .044); even stronger if domestic adoption interacted with pre-adoptive institutionalization.

CONCLUSIONS

Pre-adoption adversities as well as domestic vs. intercountry adoption, but not the age at placement, contributed to adolescent adoptees' developmental outcomes.

Epistemic trauma and transracial adoption: Author(iz)ing folkways of knowledge and healing

BACKGROUND

Despite contested definitions, trauma is often conceptualized as an event that shocks or overloads human systems, shaping memory and meanings as the body and mind attempt to cope and survive. Adoption is often the presumed redress for childhood trauma. Thus, few scholars have examined how, or if, some conditions of adoption or the status itself might involve unique traumas or adversities.

OBJECTIVE

In this paper, I argue that the condition of being transracially adopted can represent intersectional minoritized statuses, which in turn activate potentially distinct formations of epistemic trauma- structurally and relationally transmitted harms to a person as a knower and to their capacities for claiming, making sense of, and healing through their lived experiences.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

I draw from my personal and professional standpoints as a black, mixed-race, woman who was transracially adopted from public foster care as an infant, became a child welfare caseworker and later, a child welfare scholar.

METHODS

Using a critical and reflexive autoethnographic method I ask how theories of epistemic injustice might help to highlight conditions tied to the status "transracial adoptee" that distinguish adoption-specific trauma. By reflexively analyzing my experiences in the context of extant theory and research, this paper brings theories of epistemic injustice into conversation with an emic perspective on adoption.

RESULTS

In my experience, "transracial adoptee" and "mixed race" operated as statuses that occasioned epistemic injustices. I propose these conditions can become traumatic when they chronically and structurally disenfranchise claiming and cultivating folkways essential to one's healing and resilience across the life course.

CONCLUSIONS

This paper is a call to invest in advancing epistemologies of adoption and theories of trauma that are anchored within diverse adoption experiences. I also invite future scholarship to explore epistemic injustice in adoption as trauma, and to identify and disrupt the many spaces in which it may be enacted culturally, relationally, familially, and in a society through its laws, policies, practices, and scientific knowledge.

The trauma and healing of consciousness

BACKGROUND

Throughout my graduate coursework, several classes focused on trauma. Considering my experiences, I searched to gain insight into group level trauma adoptees face due to our unique status and common societal factors that influence adoption. Exploring the trauma literature, I found that none of the terms quite represented the complex characteristics of adoption.

OBJECTIVE

Realizing the limitations of current trauma definitions, I sought to name group trauma for adoptees and thereby legitimize and validate my and other adoptees' experiences.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

I am the sole participant. The research was conducted in St. Louis, Missouri.

METHODS

In this autoethnography, I recount academic experiences that have shaped my emerging and interconnected identities as an adoptee and social worker. I analyze the traumatic and empowering impacts of gaining more information about adoption as a politically and economically influenced system.

RESULTS

Examining my intertwined adoption and academic journeys, I propose a trauma and healing of consciousness framework to understand trauma for groups of individuals like adoptees whose trauma is not recognized using historical, collective, or intergenerational models.

CONCLUSIONS

The term trauma of consciousness expands existing theories of trauma while including social groups for whom group trauma was not previously recognized. Understanding the trauma of consciousness is imperative because healing cannot begin until the existence of the trauma is recognized. Further exploration on the trauma of consciousness is needed to recognize its impact and to develop creative interventions that can provide hope and enable people to move forward.

Rediscovering latent trauma: An adopted adult's perspective

Though studies showing a causal relationship between adoption and trauma are scarce, there is enough cross-disciplinary research to suggest such a connection. Likewise, there are many adult adopted persons, like myself, who see their adoption narratives as traumatic in one way or another. Mental health outcomes for adopted people also indicate adoption might be a source of and not just a preventative measure against trauma. In this paper, I utilize an autoethnographic approach to highlight the relationship between infant adoption and what I refer to as "latent traumatic memories." Recounting several major life events that led to traumatic upheavals in my understanding of my own identity as an adopted person, I then relate my story to current research on trauma experienced very early in life and how it is remembered implicitly in the body. My account, I argue, highlights the need to further research adopted people's evolving views about their adoption and how and to what extent certain events in adulthood precipitate the rediscovery of latent trauma.

Does birth matter?

This paper is a response to a recent paper by Bobier and Omelianchuk in which they argue that the critics of Giubilini and Minerva's defence of infanticide fail to adequately justify a moral difference at birth. They argue that such arguments would lead to an intuitively less plausible position: that late-term abortions are permissible, thus creating a dilemma for those who seek to argue that birth matters. I argue that the only way to resolve this dilemma, is to bite the naturalist bullet and accept that the intuitively plausible idea that birth constitutes a morally relevant event is simply mistaken and biologically misinformed.

The Long Road to Parenthood: Assisted Reproduction, Surrogacy, and Adoption Among US Surgeons

OBJECTIVE

We sought to characterize demographics, costs, and workplace support for surgeons using assisted reproductive technology (ART), adoption, and surrogacy to build their families.

SUMMARY BACKGROUND DATA

As the surgical workforce diversifies, the needs of surgeons building a family are changing. ART, adoption, and surrogacy may be used with greater frequency among female surgeons who delay childbearing and surgeons in same-sex relationships. Little is known about costs and workplace support for these endeavors.

METHODS

An electronic survey was distributed to surgeons through surgical societies and social media. Rates of ART use were compared between partners of male surgeons and female surgeons and multivariate analysis used to assess risk factors. Surgeons using ART, adoption, or surrogacy were asked to describe costs and time off work to pursue these options.

RESULTS

Eight hundred and fifty-nine surgeons participated. Compared to male surgeons, female surgeons were more likely to report delaying children due to surgical training (64.9% vs. 43.5%, P < 0.001), have fewer children (1.9 vs. 2.4, p < 0.001), and use ART (25.2% vs. 17.4%, P = 0.035). Compared to non-surgeon partners of male surgeons, female surgeons were older at first pregnancy (33 vs 31 years, P < 0.001) with age > 35 years associated with greater odds of ART use (odds ratio 3.90; 95% confidence interval 2.74-5.55, P < 0.001). One-third of surgeons using ART spent >$40,000; most took minimal time off work for treatments. Forty-five percent of same-sex couples used adoption or surrogacy. 60% of surgeons using adoption or surrogacy spent >$40,000 and most took minimal paid parental leave.

CONCLUSIONS

ART, adoption, or surrogacy is costly and lacks strong workplace support in surgery, disproportionately impacting women and same-sex couples. Equitable and inclusive environments supporting all routes to parenthood ensure recruitment and retention of a diverse workforce. Surgical leaders must enact policies and practices to normalize childbearing as part of an early surgical career, including financial support and equitable parental leave for a growing group of surgeons pursuing ART, surrogacy, or adoption to become parents.

Severe deprivation in early childhood leads to permanent growth stunting: Longitudinal analysis of height trajectories from childhood-to-adulthood

BACKGROUND

Childhood institutional deprivation is associated with growth stunting in childhood but long-term effects in adulthood remain uncertain.

OBJECTIVE

To examine the impact of global institutional deprivation experienced in early childhood on subsequent growth with a special focus on final adult height and puberty timing.

PARTICIPANTS & SETTING

The study was originally set in the UK, though some adoptive families lived abroad by the time of the adult follow up. 165 individuals adopted by UK families before 43 months of age from Romanian orphanages after the fall of the Ceaușescu regime in the early 1990's were compared to 51 non-deprived UK adoptees, adopted before the age of 6 months.

METHODS

The English and Romanian Adoptees (ERA) study is a 20-year longitudinal natural experiment on the effects of institutional deprivation on development. Key growth milestones were extracted from growth curve modelling of height data collected at ages 4, 6, 11, 15 and 23 years using a Bayesian approach to fit the JPA2 model.

RESULTS

Deprivation effects on height were present at the take-off point of accelerating adolescent growth and persisted into adulthood - the largest effects being for individuals who experienced over six months of deprivation. Deprivation was associated with earlier take-off and achievement of peak height velocity of adolescent growth acceleration - an effect driven largely by females' data and correlated with parent ratings of pubertal development.

CONCLUSIONS

Early deprivation appears to reset tempo of growth early in development leading to permanent growth stunting in adulthood and accelerated onset of puberty, specifically in females.

Parent Contributions to the Development of Political Attitudes in Adoptive and Biological Families

Where do our political attitudes originate? Although early research attributed the formation of such beliefs to parent and peer socialization, genetically sensitive designs later clarified the substantial role of genes in the development of sociopolitical attitudes. However, it has remained unclear whether parental influence on offspring attitudes persists beyond adolescence. In a unique sample of 394 adoptive and biological families with offspring more than 30 years old, biometric modeling revealed significant evidence for genetic and nongenetic transmission from both parents for the majority of seven political-attitude phenotypes. We found the largest genetic effects for religiousness and social liberalism, whereas the largest influence of parental environment was seen for political orientation and egalitarianism. Together, these findings indicate that genes, environment, and the gene-environment correlation all contribute significantly to sociopolitical attitudes held in adulthood, and the etiology and development of those attitudes may be more important than ever in today's rapidly changing sociopolitical landscape.

Psychological Adjustment in Adult Adoptees: A Meta-Analysis

BACKGROUND

Little is known about the effect adoption status has on psychological adjustment (for instance, depression, anxiety, problem behaviour, or drug misuse) in adulthood. The aim of this study was to conduct a meta-analysis to study the impact of adoption status on adult adoptees' psychological adjustment.

METHOD

The review included 18 quasi-experimental studies conducted between 1993 and 2019.

RESULTS

Adoptees had significantly worse psychological adjustment than non-adoptees across all outcomes, except for the obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and antisocial personality disorder (APD). The moderating analyses showed a significant effect for ethnicity and marital status.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results shed light on the specific groups of adoptees at a higher risk of maladjustment. The outcomes most strongly influenced by adoptive status were angry emotions (hostility and anger), psychiatric care, drug abuse, and psychotic symptoms. These findings have clinical implications with regard to the support that practitioners can provide to adoptees and their families.

Spatial dependence and determinants of conservation easement adoptions in the United States

A conservation easement is a market-based instrument for environmental protection. It has achieved rapid growth in the United States over the past few decades. As of 2015, 1.75% of the country's total land was placed under the restriction of conservation easements. In this study, spatial dependence in adopting conservation easements in the United States and the underlying determinants are examined through a spatial econometric model. The spatial panel data covers 50 individual states and six five-year intervals from 1990 to 2015. The findings reveal that spatial correlation in adopting conservation easements across individual states has become stronger over the study period, and the indirect spillover effect for most covariates is as high as one-third of the total effect. In addition, conservation easements have been utilized to protect threatened or strained natural resources. Populations with higher income or better education generally have helped the development of conservation easements. Government programs and policies favoring conservation easements also have positive impacts on easement adoption. These results can aid policymakers, landowners, and easement holders to efficiently allocate resources in acquiring conservation easements and managing currently eased land.

Singapore's COVID-19 "circuit breaker" interventions: A description of individual-level adoptions of precautionary behaviours

INTRODUCTION

Effectiveness of COVID-19 control interventions relies significantly on behavioural modifications of its population. Differing adoption rates impacts subsequent COVID-19 control. Hence, positive and sustained behavioural modification is essential for disease control. We describe the adoption rates of behavioural modifications for Singapore's "circuit-breaker" (CB), the national public health response to the COVID-19 crisis, among the general population in the community.

METHODS

We conducted an interrupted-time series study using retrospective secondary data. We compared the proportion of Singaporeans who reported adopting specific behaviour modifications before, during and after CB. Behaviours of interest were working from home, performing hand hygiene, using face mask in public, and avoiding crowded areas. We compared change in incidence rates for community COVID-19 cases among the general population across the same time periods.

RESULTS

There was an increase in face mask usage (+46.9%, 95% confidence interval [CI] 34.9-58.8, P<0.01) and working from home (+20.4%, 95% CI 11.7-29.2, P<0.01) during CB than before CB in Singapore. Other self-reported behaviours showed no statistically significant difference. Change in daily incidence rates of community COVID-19 cases decreased from additional 0.73 daily case before CB to 0.55 fewer case per day during CB (P<0.01). There was no significant difference among all behaviour adoption rates after CB. Daily incidence of community cases continued to decrease by 0.11 case daily after CB.

CONCLUSION

Community incidence of COVID-19 in Singapore decreased during CB and remained low after CB. Use of face masks and social-distancing compliance through working from home increased during CB. However, it is unlikely to influence other sources of COVID-19 such as imported cases or within foreign worker dormitories.

Intragroup Differences of the Non-Religious: Attitudes Toward Same-Sex Marriage and Same-Sex Adoption in the United States

The Non-religious have been growing in numbers in the United States over the past decade. Yet even with their now large numbers we know little about the differences between various versions of non-religious affiliation. Using 2014 survey data from the Public Religion Research Institute this paper examines the attitudes toward same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption of the non-religious. Two non-religious groups are examined Non-theists (atheists and agnostics) and the Religiously Disengaged (non-religious but not atheist or agnostic). Our hypotheses ask if Non-theists are more likely to support same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption than the Religiously Disengaged. The hypotheses are tested across regression models that account for lingering religiosity, religious upbringing, and knowing a homosexual person. The data indicate that there are significant differences between Non-theists and the Religiously Disengaged across all models, with Non-theists being more likely to support same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption than the Religiously Disengaged.

Identifying treatment moderators of a trauma-informed parenting intervention with children in foster care: Using model-based recursive partitioning

BACKGROUND

Trauma-informed parenting interventions have been used in child welfare to help caregivers respond to children in trauma-informed ways that can mitigate the effects of maltreatment and build strong caregiver-child relationships. Existing studies support their effectiveness with children and youth involved in the child welfare system. However, to further advance the effectiveness of evidenced-based intervention for child welfare populations, one key step is to identify subgroups of individuals who have different intervention responses or outcomes.

OBJECTIVE

To identify pre-treatment moderators that can distinguish subgroups of caregivers and children who benefit differently from an intervention.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

414 children in foster care (age 3 or younger) and their caregivers (birth, adoptive, kin, and nonkin) were randomly assigned to receive a trauma-informed parenting intervention in the Illinois Birth through Three Title IV-E waiver demonstration or foster care services as usual.

METHODS

Model-based Recursive Partitioning (MOB) was used to identify treatment moderators and moderator interactions. MOB fits a parametric model and uses a data-driven method to find subgroups for which the specified parametric model has different parameters. Two parametric models (logistic and linear regression) were used in accordance with two outcomes: reunification (binary) and caregiver-child attachment (continuous). We examined 21 potential pre-treatment moderators in both models.

RESULTS

For the reunification outcome, the MOB produced the following three treatment moderators, which identified subgroups of participants who responded differently to the intervention: (a) caregivers' relationship with the child (kin vs. non-kin/permanent caregivers), (b) caregiver-child attachment, and (c) case history of physical abuse. For the attachment outcome, caregivers' age was found to be a treatment moderator. Future developments of trauma-informed interventions should consider these moderators.

The role of the shared environment in college attainment: An adoption study

OBJECTIVE

College attainment is one of the few phenotypes to have substantial variance accounted for by environmental factors shared by reared-together relatives. The shared environment is implicated by the consistently strong parent-to-offspring transmission of college attainment. The mechanisms underlying this relationship remain unclear. We use genetically informative methods with a longitudinal, adoption sample to identify possible environmental mechanisms underlying parent-offspring college transmission.

METHOD

Data were drawn from the Sibling Interaction and Behavior Study (SIBS), which includes 409 adoptive and 208 nonadoptive families, consisting of two offspring followed from adolescence into young adulthood and their rearing parents. Four domains of environmental mechanisms were examined: (a) skill enhancement; (b) academic support; (c) material advantage; and (d) supportive family environment.

RESULTS

Both shared environmental and genetic factors contributed to the parent-offspring transmission of college attainment. However, highly educated parents did not appear to be increasing their adopted offspring's attainment through skill development. The environmental factors that were associated with increased odds of offspring college attainment were mother's academic expectations and family income.

CONCLUSIONS

While complete mediation of the parent-offspring transmission of college attainment was not identified, the results shed light on some of the mechanisms associated with the common environment variance in the college attainment phenotype.

Predictors of Adoption and Guardianship Dissolution: The Role of Race, Age, and Gender Among Children in Foster Care

Adoption and guardianship are meant to provide permanency to foster children when reunification is not a viable option. Unfortunately, sometimes adoption and guardianship placements dissolve resulting in children returning to care. Currently, there is limited research on the prevalence and predictors of adoption and guardianship dissolutions. This study investigated rates of guardianship and adoption dissolution using a complete entry cohort from a large state foster care system and the associations between child characteristics and risk factors with dissolution. Drawing on a complete entry cohort of foster children in Texas that exited to either adoption or guardianship placements, results demonstrated that over 2% of adoptive placements and 7% of guardianship placements were dissolved. Compared with White and Hispanic children, Black children had a higher risk of guardianship, but not adoption, dissolution. Older age was associated with a higher risk of adoption dissolution, and females had a higher risk of guardianship dissolution than males. Behavior problems, cognitive disability status, and mental health issues were all associated with a higher risk of dissolution. These findings have important implications for caseworkers and policymakers on permanency for children in adoptive or guardianship placements.

Surrogate Motherhood: Babies for Fun and Profit

Surrogate motherhood has captured the attention of both the media and the legal profession in the past several years. Courts faced with litigation on surrogate motherhood have uniformly taken the position that these arrangements are contrary to public policy, and have refused to compel the specific performance of these contracts? It is my position that these rulings have been correct, and that if surrogate motherhood is to be considered legally acceptable in this country (which I think it should not be ) then state legislatures must act to legalize the contracts drawn up for these arrangements.

The procedure for surrogate motherhood is usually initiated by either a married couple, of whom the wife is infertile, or by a single man. In either case, a contract is made with a fertile woman; the woman is to be artificially inseminated with the man's sperm. Generally, this is done in exchange for a large sum of money. At the time that the baby is born, the surrogate mother surrenders the child for adoption by the wife (in the case of a married couple) and presumably by the father to regularize his relationship with the child.

The Contract in Surrogate Motherhood: A Review of the Issues

Surrogate motherhood, as it is practiced today, differs only in insemination technique from this biblical effort. A married couple, unable to conceive because of female infertility, or, perhaps, a single male who desires a child would, as did Sarah, seek out a woman willing to act as a surrogate mother It is likely that the couple would make the initial contact through a classified advertisement and negotiate a contract with a fertile woman through their attorneys. The contract, in its most basic terms, would provide that the surrogate be artificially inseminated with the husband's semen, carry the child to term, and relinquish her parental rights upon birth of the child. Although there have been cases where a woman becomes a surrogate mother without payment, the surrogate mother typically receives a fee for her services as a carrier.

Shared Environment and Genetics Shape the Gut Microbiome after Infant Adoption

The composition of the human gut microbiome is highly variable, and this variation has been repeatedly tied to variation in human health. However, the sources of microbial variation remain unclear, especially early in life. It is particularly important to understand sources of early life variation in the microbiome because the state of the microbiome in childhood can influence lifelong health. Here, we compared the gut microbiomes of children adopted in infancy to those of genetically unrelated children in the same household and genetically related children raised in other households. We observed that a shared home environment was the strongest predictor of overall microbiome similarity. Among those microbial taxa whose variation was significantly explained by our models, the abundance of a given taxon was more frequently explained by host genetic similarity (relatedness), while the presence of a given taxon was more dependent upon a shared home environment. This suggests that although the home environment may act as a species source pool for the gut microbiome in childhood, host genetic factors likely drive variation in microbial abundance once a species colonizes the gut.IMPORTANCE Our results demonstrate that the early life home environment can significantly alter the gut microbiome in childhood, potentially altering health outcomes or risk for adverse health outcomes. A better understanding of the drivers of gut microbiome variation during childhood could lead to more effective intervention strategies for overall health starting in early life.

[Genetic screening of adopted individuals]

Information regarding hereditary disease predisposition is generally inaccessible for adoptees. The lack of family history restricts access to various surveillance programmes and the overall health of the adoptee. Genetic screening of asymptomatic adoptees could be a compensational tool. However, variant classification is difficult, even more so in certain ethnic groups and in cases where there is no knowledge of family history, as summarised in this review. The usefulness of genetic screening of asymptomatic adoptees is still unknown and requires further research for clarification.

Acquisition of oral microbiota is driven by environment, not host genetics

BACKGROUND

The oral microbiota is acquired very early, but the factors shaping its acquisition are not well understood. Previous studies comparing monozygotic (MZ) and dizygotic (DZ) twins have suggested that host genetics plays a role. However, all twins share an equal portion of their parent's genome, so this model is not informative for studying parent-to-child transmission. We used a novel study design that allowed us to directly examine the genetics of transmission by comparing the oral microbiota of biological versus adoptive mother-child dyads.

RESULTS

No difference was observed in how closely oral bacterial community profiles matched for adoptive versus biological mother-child pairs, indicating little if any effect of host genetics on the fidelity of transmission. Both adopted and biologic children more closely resembled their own mother as compared to unrelated women, supporting the role of contact and environment. Mother-child strain similarity increased with the age of the child, ruling out early effects of host genetic influence that are lost over time. No effect on the fidelity of mother-child strain sharing from vaginal birth or breast feeding was seen. Analysis of extended families showed that fathers and mothers were equally similar to their children, and that cohabitating couples showed even greater strain similarity than mother-child pairs. These findings support the role of contact and shared environment, and age, but not genetics, as determinants of microbial transmission, and were consistent at both species and strain level resolutions, and across multiple oral habitats. In addition, analysis of individual species all showed similar results.

CONCLUSIONS

The host is clearly active in shaping the composition of the oral microbiome, since only a few of the many bacterial species in the larger environment are capable of colonizing the human oral cavity. Our findings suggest that these host mechanisms are universally shared among humans, since no effect of genetic relatedness on fidelity of microbial transmission could be detected. Instead our findings point towards contact and shared environment being the driving factors of microbial transmission, with a unique combination of these factors ultimately shaping the highly personalized human oral microbiome. Video abstract.

Aggressiveness in Adopted and Non-Adopted Teens: The Role of Parenting, Attachment Security, and Gender

The aim of this study was to examine the relationship among aggressiveness, parenting practices, and attachment security in adolescents, assessing maternal and paternal effects separately. Two different subsamples of adolescents between 12 and 16 years old participated in the study (n = 157): 67 adopted adolescents (61.2% girls) and 90 non-adopted adolescents (56.7% girls). Partial and full mediation models were analyzed in multi-group structural equation models (using maximum likelihood estimates), allocating non-adoptive and adoptive adolescents into two different groups. Results showed that whereas acceptance/involvement of each parent predicted attachment security towards the corresponding parental figure, only the father's coercion/imposition predicted aggressiveness, and only attachment security to the mother was a (negative) predictor of adolescent's aggressiveness. The partial mediation model provided the most parsimonious explanation for the data, showing no differences between adopted and non-adopted subsamples and supporting a good model fit for both boys and girls in a multi-group invariance analysis. The implications of these results are discussed in light of the protective effects of care relationships in early adolescence (vs. late adolescence) as well as the differential role of parent figures.

The Nutritional Status of Individuals Adopted Internationally as Children: A Systematic Review

Since 1955, international adoption has been a way of finding homes for children who have been orphaned or abandoned. We aimed to describe the nutritional status of individuals adopted internationally and their long-term nutritional and health outcomes. We searched four databases for articles published from January 1995 to June 2020, which included information on anthropometric or micronutrient status of children adopted internationally (CAI). Mean Z-scores on arrival to adoptive country ranged from -2.04 to -0.31 for weight for age; -0.94 to 0.39 for weight for height; -0.7 to 0 for body mass index; -1.89 to -0.03 for height for age; -1.43 to 0.80 for head circumference for age. Older children, those adopted from institutionalized care or with underlying disability, were more likely to be malnourished. Though long-term data was scarce, mean Z-scores post-adoption ranged from -0.59 to 0.53 for weight for age; -0.31 to 1.04 for weight for height; 0.39 to 1.04 for body mass index; -1.09 to 0.58 for height for age; -0.06 to 1.23 for head circumference for age. We conclude that though CAI are at high risk of malnutrition at baseline, marked catch-up growth is possible, including for those older than two years of age on arrival. This has implications not only for CAI but for the wider population of malnourished children worldwide. Research on how to optimize catch-up growth is a priority.

Abuse after abuse: The recurrent maltreatment of American Indian children in foster care and adoption

BACKGROUND

While maltreated children are at risk for recurrent maltreatment, less is known about the maltreatment recurrence of American Indian children in foster and adoptive homes.

OBJECTIVE

This study examined the recurrent maltreatment of American Indian children in foster and adoptive homes, specifically the physical, emotional, sexual, and spiritual abuse subtypes, as well as poly-victimization of American Indian children in comparison to their White peers.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

Data originated from the Experiences of Adopted and Fostered Individuals Project. The sample (n = 230) consisted of 99 American Indian and 131 White participants who experienced foster care and/or adoption during childhood.

METHOD

Chi-square analyses and a t-test were used to test differences in maltreatment recurrence. Ordinary least squares regression analysis was used to examine the factors that contributed to poly-victimization.

RESULTS

Both American Indian and White participants reported high rates of emotional abuse. American Indian participants were particularly vulnerable to maltreatment recurrence in the forms of physical, sexual, and spiritual abuse, as well as poly-victimization in their foster and adoptive homes.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings reflect high rates of maltreatment recurrence in foster care and adoption, which may be the result of retrospective self-report, rather than measures of rereport or substantiated recurrence.

No Evidence for Passive Gene-Environment Correlation or the Influence of Genetic Risk for Psychiatric Disorders on Adult Body Composition via the Adoption Design

The relationship between genetic and environmental risk is complex and for many traits, estimates of genetic effects may be inflated by passive gene-environment correlation. This arises because biological offspring inherit both their genotypes and rearing environment from their parents. We tested for passive gene-environment correlation in adult body composition traits using the 'natural experiment' of childhood adoption, which removes passive gene-environment correlation within families. Specifically, we compared 6165 adoptees with propensity score matched non-adoptees in the UK Biobank. We also tested whether passive gene-environment correlation inflates the association between psychiatric genetic risk and body composition. We found no evidence for inflation of heritability or polygenic scores in non-adoptees compared to adoptees for a range of body composition traits. Furthermore, polygenic risk scores for anorexia nervosa, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and schizophrenia did not differ in their influence on body composition traits in adoptees and non-adoptees. These findings suggest that passive gene-environment correlation does not inflate genetic effects for body composition, or the influence of psychiatric disorder genetic risk on body composition. Our design does not look at passive gene-environment correlation in childhood, and does not test for 'pure' environmental effects or the effects of active and evocative gene-environment correlations, where child genetics directly influences home environment. However, these findings suggest that genetic influences identified for body composition in this adult sample are direct, and not confounded by the family environment provided by biological relatives.

The intergenerational transmission of mathematics achievement in middle childhood: A prospective adoption design

The present study uses a parent-offspring adoption design to examine the dual roles of heritable and environmental influences on children's mathematics achievement. Linked sets (N = 195) of adopted children, adoptive parents, and birth parents each completed a measure of mathematics fluency (i.e., simple computational operations). Birth parent mathematics achievement and adoptive father mathematics achievement positively correlated with child achievement scores at age 7, whereas adoptive mother and adopted child mathematics achievement scores were not significantly associated with one another. Additionally, findings demonstrated no significant effects of gene-environment interactions on child mathematics achievement at age 7. These results indicate that both heritable and rearing environmental factors contribute to children's mathematics achievement and identify unique influences of the paternal rearing environment on mathematics achievement in middle childhood.

A label's a label, no matter the dog: Evaluating the generalizability of the removal of breed labels from adoption cards

A common barrier to entry for New York City (NYC) dog adopters trying to rent apartments is the breed label the animal shelter assigned to their dog, despite the fact the labelling is primarily based on intuition and appearance. Bideawee, a limited admission shelter with three locations in the greater New York area, including one in NYC, phased out breed labels from their adoption cards in December 2017. In this study, we evaluated the generalizability of previous findings, specifically, that the removal of breed labels from adoption cards affected length of stay. Moreover, due to Bideawee's multi-location structure, this study provided a unique opportunity to compare variables across different shelter sites while having shelter administration practices held constant. Data from 16-month time periods before and after breed labels were removed was compared. The median length of stay of a dog at Bideawee decreased by 11.3 days (-37.3%) once breed labels were removed (Mdn = 19.0) compared to when breed labels were in place (Mdn = 30.3). A Mann Whitney test indicated that this difference was statistically significant (U(Nno breed labels = 1259, Nbreed labels = 987) = 386309.5, z = -15.41, p < .001). Dogs with a "green" behavior assessments (on a scale of green, blue, yellow, red) were almost four and a half times more likely to be adopted faster than "red" dogs (HR: 4.495, 95% CI 2.755-7.335, p < .001) before breed labels were removed, but only two times as likely to be adopted faster afterwards (HR: 2.220, 95% CI 1.514-3.254, p < .001). The return rate stayed constant across the two time periods at 6%. These findings provide new insights on dog adoptions in the NYC area and suggest that the removal of breed labels will help all dogs get adopted from animal shelters.

Separating Measured Genetic and Environmental Effects: Evidence Linking Parental Genotype and Adopted Child Outcomes

There has been widespread adoption of genome wide summary scores (polygenic scores) as tools for studying the importance of genetics and associated life course mechanisms across a range of demographic and socioeconomic outcomes. However, an often unacknowledged issue with these studies is that parental genetics impact both child environments and child genetics, leaving the effects of polygenic scores difficult to interpret. This paper uses multi-generational data containing polygenic scores for parents (n = 7193) and educational outcomes for adopted (n = 855) and biological (n = 20,939) children, many raised in the same families, which allows us to separate the influence of parental polygenic scores on children outcomes between environmental (adopted children) and environmental and genetic (biological children) effects. Our results complement recent work on "genetic nurture" by showing associations of parental polygenic scores with adopted children's schooling, providing additional evidence that polygenic scores combine genetic and environmental influences and that research designs are needed to separate these estimated impacts.

Separating Measured Genetic and Environmental Effects: Evidence Linking Parental Genotype and Adopted Child Outcomes

There has been widespread adoption of genome wide summary scores (polygenic scores) as tools for studying the importance of genetics and associated life course mechanisms across a range of demographic and socioeconomic outcomes. However, an often unacknowledged issue with these studies is that parental genetics impact both child environments and child genetics, leaving the effects of polygenic scores difficult to interpret. This paper uses multi-generational data containing polygenic scores for parents (n = 7193) and educational outcomes for adopted (n = 855) and biological (n = 20,939) children, many raised in the same families, which allows us to separate the influence of parental polygenic scores on children outcomes between environmental (adopted children) and environmental and genetic (biological children) effects. Our results complement recent work on "genetic nurture" by showing associations of parental polygenic scores with adopted children's schooling, providing additional evidence that polygenic scores combine genetic and environmental influences and that research designs are needed to separate these estimated impacts.

Using a sibling-adoption design to parse genetic and environmental influences on children's body mass index (BMI)

Dietary and physical activity behaviors formed early in life can increase risk for childhood obesity and have continued negative consequences for lifelong health. Previous research has highlighted the importance of both genetic and environmental (e.g., cultural environment or parental lifestyle) contributions to obesity risk, although these studies typically involve genetically-related individuals residing in the same household, where genetic similarity and rearing environment are inextricably linked. Here we utilize a sibling-adoption design to independently estimate genetic and environmental contributions to obesity risk in childhood and describe how these influences might vary as children age. As part of a prospective adoption study, the current investigation used data from biological siblings reared either apart or together, and nonbiological siblings reared together to estimate the contributions of genetics and environment to body mass indices (BMI) in a large cohort of children (N = 711). We used a variance partitioning model to allocate variation in BMI to that which is due to shared genetics, common environment, or unique environment in this cohort during middle childhood and adolescence. We found 63% of the total variance in BMI could be attributed to heritable factors in middle childhood sibling pairs (age 5-11.99; 95% CI [0.41,0.85]). Additionally, we observed that common environment explained 31% of variation in BMI in this group (95% CI [0.11,0.5]), with unique environment and error explaining the remaining variance. We failed to detect an influence of genetics or common environment in older sibling pairs (12-18) or pairs spanning childhood and adolescence (large sibling age difference), but home type (adoptive versus birth) was an important predictor of BMI in adolescence. The presence of strong common environment effects during childhood suggests that early interventions at the family level in middle childhood could be effective in mitigating obesity risk in later childhood and adolescence.

The Rearing Environment and Risk for Major Depression: A Swedish National High-Risk Home-Reared and Adopted-Away Co-Sibling Control Study

OBJECTIVE

The authors sought to clarify the role of rearing environment in the etiology of major depression.

METHODS

Defining high risk as having at least one biological parent with major depression, the authors identified a Swedish National Sample of 666 high-risk full sibships and 2,596 high-risk half sibships containing at least one home-reared and one adopted-away sibling. Major depression was assessed from national medical registries.

RESULTS

Controlling for sex, parental age at birth, and, for half siblings, history of major depression in the nonshared parent, the risk for major depression in the matched adopted compared with home-reared full and half siblings was reduced by 23% (95% CI=7-36) and by 19% (95% CI=10-38), respectively. This protective rearing effect was not influenced by the relative educational status of the biological and adoptive parents. However, in both full and half sibships, the protective effect of adoption disappeared when an adoptive parent or stepsibling had major depression or the adoptive home was disrupted by parental death or divorce.

CONCLUSIONS

In matched full and half sibships at high risk for major depression, compared with individuals raised in their home environment, those reared in adoptive homes (homes selected in Sweden for their high-quality rearing environment) had a significantly reduced risk for major depression. This protective effect disappeared if an adoptive parent had major depression or if the adoptive home experienced parental death or divorce during childhood/adolescence. The rearing environment has a meaningful impact on risk for major depression, and this effect is likely mediated both by parental depression and the continuity or disruption of the home environment.

Comparison of Adopted and Nonadopted Individuals Reveals Gene-Environment Interplay for Education in the UK Biobank

Polygenic scores now explain approximately 10% of the variation in educational attainment. However, they capture not only genetic propensity but also information about the family environment. This is because of passive gene-environment correlation, whereby the correlation between offspring and parent genotypes results in an association between offspring genotypes and the rearing environment. We measured passive gene-environment correlation using information on 6,311 adoptees in the UK Biobank. Adoptees' genotypes were less correlated with their rearing environments because they did not share genes with their adoptive parents. We found that polygenic scores were twice as predictive of years of education in nonadopted individuals compared with adoptees (R²s = .074 vs. .037, p = 8.23 × 10^-24). Individuals in the lowest decile of polygenic scores for education attained significantly more education if they were adopted, possibly because of educationally supportive adoptive environments. Overall, these results suggest that genetic influences on education are mediated via the home environment.

Maternal half-sibling families with discordant fathers: a contrastive design assessing cross-generational paternal genetic transmission of alcohol use disorder, drug abuse and major depression

BACKGROUND

We introduce and apply an elegant, contrastive genetic-epidemiological design - Maternal Half-Sibling Families with Discordant Fathers - to clarify cross-generational transmission of genetic risk to alcohol use disorder (AUD), drug abuse (DA) and major depression (MD).

METHOD

Using Swedish national registries, we identified 73 108 eligible pairs of reared together maternal half-siblings and selected those whose biological fathers were discordant for AUD, DA and MD, and had minimal contact with the affected father. We examined differences in outcome in half-siblings with an affected v. unaffected father.

RESULTS

For AUD, DA and MD, the HR (95% confidence intervals) for the offspring of affected v. unaffected fathers were, respectively, 1.72 (1.61; 1.84), 1.55 (1.41; 1.70) and 1.51 (1.40; 1.64). Paternal DA and AUD, but not MD, predicted risk in offspring for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, conduct disorder, and poor educational performance and attainment. Offspring of affected v. unaffected fathers had poorer pregnancy outcomes, with the effect strongest for DA and weakest for MD. A range of potential biases and confounders were examined and were not found to alter these findings substantially.

CONCLUSION

Reared together maternal half-siblings differ in their paternal genetic endowment, sharing the same mother, family, school and community. They can help clarify the nature of paternal genetic effects and produce results consistent with other designs. Paternal genetic risk for DA and AUD have effects on offspring educational achievement, child and adult psychopathology, and possibly prenatal development. The impact of paternal genetic risk for MD is narrower in scope.

Addressing perceived economic obstacles to genetic testing as a way to mitigate disparities in family health history for adoptees

In this paper, we ask whether or not we can afford to realize the potential benefits of genetic testing as a screening tool for adoptees. Our method is to provide reasonable cost and savings estimates. We argue that the prospect of cost neutrality should be sufficient to explore the targeted screening for a population who will otherwise suffer an avoidable health disparity in access to inherited disease information. Our goal here is to establish that the investment needed to attain these benefits is not beyond our means.

A moral argument for frozen human embryo adoption

Some people (e.g., Drs. Paul and Susan Lim) and, with them, organizations (e.g., the National Embryo Donation Center) believe that, morally speaking, the death of a frozen human embryo is a very bad thing. With such people and organizations in mind, the question to be addressed here is as follows: if one believes that the death of a frozen embryo is a very bad thing, ought, morally speaking, one prevent the death of at least one frozen embryo via embryo adoption? By way of a three-premise argument, one of which is a moral principle first introduced by Peter Singer, my answer to this question is: at least some of those who believe this ought to. (Just who the "some" are is identified in the paper.) If this is correct, then, for said people, preventing the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is not a morally neutral matter; it is, instead, a morally laden one. Specifically, their intentional refusal to prevent the death of a frozen embryo via embryo adoption is, at a minimum, morally criticizable and, arguably, morally forbidden. Either way, it is, to one extent or another, a moral failing.

The Care of the Infant Being Placed for Adoption

Adoption in the United States is a way for families to grow, and pediatricians will invariably take care of infants being placed for adoption. Reasons why an infant will be adopted are highly variable, as are the types of relationships that birth parents have with their infants. Care of the infant being placed for adoption in the nursery involves close attention to detail to ensure appropriate continuity of care and information as the infant transitions into their eventual medical home. Adoptive parents often seek additional information from their child's health care providers, and pediatricians should be equipped to provide guidance both prior to and after the adoption process. Office-based pediatricians should support adoptive parents with a longitudinal approach informed by best practices and principles of well-child care. [Pediatr Ann. 2020;49(2):e61-e63.].