Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Genetic and Environmental Influences on Adolescents’ Smoking Involvement: A Multi-informant Twin Study

  • Original Research
  • Published:
Behavior Genetics Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Studying monozygotic and dizygotic adolescent twin pairs of both sexes reared together, the present study examined the extent to which the variance in smoking involvement is attributable to genetic and environmental effects, and to what extent there are sex differences in the etiology. Questionnaire data on how often the adolescent had ever smoked tobacco was collected from a population-based twin sample consisting of seven national birth cohorts (ages 12–18), their mothers, and their fathers (N = 1,394 families). The data was analyzed with multivariate genetic modeling, using a multi-informant design. The etiological structure of smoking involvement was best represented in an ACE common pathway model, with smoking defined as a latent factor loading onto all three informants’ reports. Estimates could be set equal across sexes. Results showed that adolescent lifetime smoking involvement was moderately heritable (37 %). The largest influence was from the shared environment (56 %), while environmental effects unique to each twin had minimal influence (7 %).

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Agrawal A, Heath AC, Grant JD, Pergadia ML, Statham DJ, Bucholz KK, Martin NG, Madden PAF (2006) Assortative mating for cigarette smoking and for alcohol consumption in female Australian twins and their spouses. Behav Genet 36(4):553–566

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Akaike H (1987) Factor analysis and AIC. Psychometrika 52(3):317–332

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ask H, Rognmo K, Torvik FA, Røysamb E, Tambs K (2012) Non-random mating and convergence over time for alcohol consumption, smoking, and exercise: the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study. Behav Genet 42(3):354–365

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bartels M, Boomsma DI, Hudziak JJ, Van Beijsterveldt T, Van den Oord E (2007) Twins and the study of rater (dis) agreement. Psychol Methods 12(4):451–466

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bergen SE, Gardner CO, Kendler KS (2007) Age-related changes in heritability of behavioral phenotypes over adolescence and young adulthood: a meta-analysis. Twin Res Hum Genet 10(03):423–433

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Bierut LJ (2011) Genetic vulnerability and susceptibility to substance dependence. Neuron 69(4):618–627

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Boker S, Neale M, Maes H, Wilde M, Spiegel M, Brick T, Spies J, Estabrook R, Kenny S, Bates T, Mehta P, Fox J (2011) OpenMx: an open source extended structural equation modeling framework. Psychometrika 76(2):306–317

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Boomsma DI, Koopmans JR, Van Doornen LJ, Orlebeke JF (1994) Genetic and social influences on starting to smoke: A study of Dutch adolescent twins and their parents. Addiction 89(2):219–226

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Chassin L, Presson CC, Rose JS, Sherman SJ (1996) The natural history of cigarette smoking from adolescence to adulthood: demographic predictors of continuity and change. Health Psychol 15(6):478–484

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Dick DM, Barman S, Pitkänen T (2006) Genetic and environmental influences on the initiation and continuation of smoking and drinking. In: Pulkkinen L, Kaprio J, Rose RJ (eds) Socioemotional development and health from adolescence to adulthood. Cambridge University Press, New York, pp 127–145

    Google Scholar 

  • Dick DM, Viken R, Purcell S, Kaprio J, Pulkkinen L, Rose RJ (2007) Parental monitoring moderates the importance of genetic and environmental influences on adolescent smoking. J Abnorm Psychol 116(1):213

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Fowler T, Lifford K, Shelton K, Rice F, Thapar A, Neale MC, McBride A, van den Bree MB (2007) Exploring the relationship between genetic and environmental influences on initiation and progression of substance use. Addiction 102(3):413–422

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Friend K, Levy DT (2002) Reductions in smoking prevalence and cigarette consumption associated with mass-media campaigns. Health Educ Res 17(1):85–98

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Han C, McGue MK, Iacono WG (1999) Lifetime tobacco, alcohol and other substance use in adolescent Minnesota twins: univariate and multivariate behavioral genetic analyses. Addiction 94(7):981–993

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Heath AC, Martin NG, Lynskey MT, Todorov AA, Madden PA (2002) Estimating two-stage models for genetic influences on alcohol, tobacco or drug use initiation and dependence vulnerability in twin and family data. Twin Res 5(2):113–124

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hibell B, Guttormsson U, Ahlström S, Balakireva O, Bjarnason T, Kokkevi A, Kraus L (2009) The 2007 ESPAD report: substance use among students in 35 European countries. The Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and Other Drugs, Stockholm

    Google Scholar 

  • Hopfer CJ, Crowley TJ, Hewitt JK (2003) Review of twin and adoption studies of adolescent substance use. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry 42(6):710–719

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hopper JL, White VM, Macaskill GT, Hill DJ, Clifford CA (1992) Alcohol use, smoking habits and the adult Eysenck personality questionnaire in adolescent Australian twins [corrected].[Erratum appears in Acta Genet Med Gemellol (Roma) 1993;42(2):185]. Acta Genet Med Gemellol (Roma) 41(4):311–324

    Google Scholar 

  • Hughes JR (1986) Genetics of smoking: a brief review. Behav Ther 17(4):335–345

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Johnston LD, O’Malley PM, Bachman JG, Schulenberg JE (2005) Monitoring the future national results on adolescent drug use: overview of key findings, 2004 (NIH Publication No. 05–5726). National Institute on Drug Abuse, Bethesda

    Google Scholar 

  • Kendler KS, Neale MC, Sullivan P, Corey LA, Gardner CO, Prescott CA (1999) A population-based twin study in women of smoking initiation and nicotine dependence. Psychol Med 29(2):299–308

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Koopmans JR, van Doornen LJ, Boomsma DI (1997) Association between alcohol use and smoking in adolescent and young adult twins: a bivariate genetic analysis. Alcohol Clin Exp Res 21(3):537–546

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Koopmans JR, Slutske WS, Heath AC, Neale MC, Boomsma DI (1999) The genetics of smoking initiation and quantity smoked in Dutch adolescent and young adult twins. Behav Genet 29(6):383–393

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Korhonen T, Latvala A, Dick D, Pulkkinen L, Rose R, Kaprio J, Huizink A (2012) Genetic and environmental influences underlying externalizing behaviors, cigarette smoking and illicit drug use across adolescence. Behav Genet 42(4):614–625

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Li MD, Cheng R, Ma JZ, Swan GE (2003) A meta-analysis of estimated genetic and environmental effects on smoking behavior in male and female adult twins. Addiction 98(1):23–31

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Maes HH, Woodard CE, Murrelle L, Meyer JM, Silberg JL, Hewitt JK, Rutter M, Simonoff E, Pickles A, Carbonneau R, Neale MC, Eaves LJ (1999) Tobacco, alcohol and drug use in eight- to sixteen-year-old twins: the Virginia Twin Study of Adolescent Behavioral Development. J Stud Alcohol 60(3):293–305

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Maes HH, Sullivan PF, Bulik CM, Neale MC, Prescott CA, Eaves LJ, Kendler KS (2004) A twin study of genetic and environmental influences on tobacco initiation, regular tobacco use and nicotine dependence. Psychol Med 34(7):1251–1261

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Maes HH, Neale MC, Kendler KS, Martin NG, Heath AC, Eaves LJ (2006) Genetic and cultural transmission of smoking initiation: an extended twin kinship model. Behav Genet 36(6):795–808

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Markon KE, Krueger RF (2004) An empirical comparison of information-theoretic selection criteria for multivariate behavior genetic models. Behav Genet 34(6):593–610

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Martin N, Boomsma D, Machin G (1997) A twin-pronged attack on complex traits. Nat Genet 17:387–392

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Mayhew K, Flay BR, Mott JA (2000) Stages in the development of adolescent smoking. Drug Alcohol Depend 59(Suppl 1):S61–S81

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • McGue M, Elkins I, Iacono WG (2000) Genetic and environmental influences on adolescent substance use and abuse. Am J Med Genet 96(5):671–677

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Neale MC, Cardon LR (1992) Methodology for genetic studies of twins and families. Kluwer Academics, Dordrecht

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Neale MC, Roysamb E, Jacobson K (2006) Multivariate genetic analysis of sex limitation and G × E interaction. Twin Res Hum Genet 9(4):481–489

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • R Core Team (2013) R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing, Vienna, Austria. http://www.R-project.org. Accessed 11 April 2014

  • Rende R, Slomkowski C, McCaffery J, Lloyd-Richardson EE, Niaura R (2005) A twin-sibling study of tobacco use in adolescence: etiology of individual differences and extreme scores. Nicotine Tob Res 7(3):413–419

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rhee SH, Hewitt JK, Young SE, Corley RP, Crowley TJ, Stallings MC (2003) Genetic and environmental influences on substance initiation, use, and problem use in adolescents. Arch Gen Psychiatry 60(12):1256–1264

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rijsdijk FV, Sham PC (2002) Analytic approaches to twin data using structural equation models. Brief Bioinform 3(2):119–133

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Rose RJ, Broms U, Korhonen T, Dick DM, Kaprio J (2009) Genetics of smoking behavior. In: Kim Y-K (ed) Handbook of behavior genetics. Springer, New York, pp 411–432

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Schepis TS, Rao U (2005) Epidemiology and etiology of adolescent smoking. Curr Opin Pediatr 17(5):607–612

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • South SC, Krueger RF (2011) Genetic and environmental influences on internalizing psychopathology vary as a function of economic status. Psychol Med 41(1):107–117

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Statistics Norway (1998-2008) Smoking habits [Statbank]. http://ssb.no/helse/statistikker/royk. Accessed 20 May 2013

  • Sullivan PF, Kendler KS (1999) The genetic epidemiology of smoking. Nicotine Tob Res 1(Suppl 2):S51–S57

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Tuvblad C, Grann M, Lichtenstein P (2006) Heritability for adolescent antisocial behavior differs with socioeconomic status: gene–environment interaction. J Child Psychol Psychiatry 47(7):734–743

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (2012) Preventing tobacco use among youth and young adults: a report of the surgeon general. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, Atlanta

  • Vedøy TF, Skretting A (2009) Ungdom og rusmidler: resultater fra spørreskjemaundersøkelser 1968-2008 [The use of alcohol and drugs among youth: results from surveys 1968-2008]. Statens institutt for rusmiddelforskning, Oslo

    Google Scholar 

  • Vink JM, Boomsma DI (2011) Interplay between heritability of smoking and environmental conditions? A comparison of two birth cohorts. BMC Public Health 11(1):316

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Waaktaar T, Torgersen S (2012) Genetic and environmental causes of variation in trait resilience in young people. Behav Genet 42(3):366–377

    Article  PubMed Central  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Waaktaar T, Torgersen S (2013) Self-efficacy is mainly genetic, not learned: a Multiple-Rater Twin Study on the causal structure of general self-efficacy in young people. Twin Res Hum Genet 16(3):651–660

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • White VM, Hopper JL, Wearing AJ, Hill DJ (2003) The role of genes in tobacco smoking during adolescence and young adulthood: a multivariate behaviour genetic investigation. Addiction 98(8):1087–1100

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • WHO (2009) Global health risks: mortality and burden of disease attributable to selected major risks. World Health Organization, Geneva. http://www.who.int/healthinfo/global_burden_disease/global_health_risks/en/. Accessed 15 April 2013

  • WHO (2011) WHO report on the global tobacco epidemic World Health Organization, Geneva. http://www.who.int/tobacco/global_report/2011/en/index.html. Accessed 20 May 2013

  • Young SE, Rhee SH, Stallings MC, Corley RP, Hewitt JK (2006) Genetic and environmental vulnerabilities underlying adolescent substance use and problem use: general or specific? Behav Genet 36(4):603–615

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

The Norwegian Research Council (Grant ref: 170089) provides core support for the longitudinal twin cohort study, and funding for this specific research (Grant ref: 213760). We would also like to thank Hermine Maes for providing assistance with OpenMx scripts.

Conflict of Interest

Karoline Brobakke Seglem, Trine Waaktaar, Helga Ask, and Svenn Torgersen declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Eastern and Southern Norway, Oslo, Norway

    Karoline Brobakke Seglem, Helga Ask & Svenn Torgersen

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, Blindern, PO Box 1094, 0317, Oslo, Norway

    Karoline Brobakke Seglem, Trine Waaktaar, Helga Ask & Svenn Torgersen

Authors
  1. Karoline Brobakke Seglem
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Trine Waaktaar
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Helga Ask
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Svenn Torgersen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Karoline Brobakke Seglem.

Additional information

Edited by Hermine Maes.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Seglem, K.B., Waaktaar, T., Ask, H. et al. Genetic and Environmental Influences on Adolescents’ Smoking Involvement: A Multi-informant Twin Study. Behav Genet 45, 171–180 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-015-9706-x

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10519-015-9706-x

Keywords

Search

Navigation