Scientists can measure IQ by ‘testing saliva and studying our DNA’
News about the breakthrough comes a day after footie pundit Jamie Carragherr, 40, was caught on camera spitting at a 14-year-old
SCIENTISTS can measure intelligence by testing saliva after showing for the first time that IQ can be predicted by studying their DNA.
Researchers have identified 538 genes that can influence how clever people are — and say they can be obtained using a simple mouth swab.
But it comes a day after football pundit Jamie Carragher, 40, showed an absence of intelligence by spitting in a girl of 14’s face.
The researchers used data from the UK Biobank — a genetic study into health and disease — to compare DNA with IQ scores in more than 240,000 people.
They found that the genes accounted for a difference of up to seven per cent in IQ by boosting the way neurons carry signals in the brain.
Some influenced other biological processes including the length of life.
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Principal investigator Prof Ian Deary, of the Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology at Edinburgh University, said: “This study suggests health and intelligence are related in part because some of the same genes influence them.”
Colleague and study leader Dr David Hill said intelligence was a “heritable trait” and the study was able to predict it in one study group “using only their DNA”.
Earlier this year, a study of more than 78,000 people uncovered 52 genes linked to intelligence. People who had them were less likely to suffer Alzheimer’s, depression, schizophrenia and obesity.
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