Part of Your Personality Is Encoded in Your Genes. Huge Analysis Links Characteristics to More Than 1,200 Common Genetic Variants

Our personalities come in all shapes and sizes, from being adventurous and extroverted to being anxious and organized. Scientists measure these characteristics using the “Big Five” personality traits: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism. They’re defined by a mixture of genetics and environmental factors—nature and nurture, as some call it.

But how much of your personality is defined by your DNA? Now, in new research published in the journal Nature on September 2, scientists have compiled dozens of study cohorts to examine more than one million people’s genes to see how they relate to their personality traits. They identified more than 1,260 common genetic variants associated with one or more of the Big Five, more than 800 of which had not previously been identified.

The findings can help researchers better understand human behavior and life outcomes on the population level. Previously, researchers have struggled to untangle the genetic component of personality. Large population databases with DNA information generally lack reliable measurements of personality, reports Nature’s Ewen Callaway.

So, Tucker-Drob and colleagues combined 46 study cohorts incorporating between about 611,000 and 1.14 million people who had provided DNA samples and taken personality questionnaires. By looking at the participants’ genomes—their complete sets of genetic instructions—the team identified genetic variants that were consistently tied to the Big Five. Need to know: Traits associated with the Big Five The variants were associated with specific health and life outcomes.

People with variants linked to extroversion, for example, were more likely to be infected with Covid-19 early in the pandemic. Because when you loosen up rules around social interaction, then the people who will take advantage of those loosening rules the most are people who have been missing that interaction most,” says Michel Nivard, a study co-author and epidemiologist at the University of Bristol in England, to Veronique Greenwood at Time. Individuals with more genetic variants tied to agreeableness were less likely to face school suspension or to run away from home.

Those with higher conscientiousness, or a capacity for productivity and organization, had less substance use and more frequently played sports. Outcomes-wise, they had fewer hospital stays and healthier aging. Openness to experience, meanwhile, was linked to more activity at night.