| Title: | Educational attainment, health outcomes and mortality: a within-sibship Mendelian randomization study |
| Journal: | International Journal of Epidemiology |
| Published: | 9 Jun 2023 |
| Pubmed: | https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37295953/ |
| DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyad079 |
| URL: | https://academic.oup.com/ije/advance-article-pdf/doi/10.1093/ije/dyad079/50565596/dyad079.pdf |
Publication 11546
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Abstract
BACKGROUND: Previous Mendelian randomization (MR) studies using population samples (population MR) have provided evidence for beneficial effects of educational attainment on health outcomes in adulthood. However, estimates from these studies may have been susceptible to bias from population stratification, assortative mating and indirect genetic effects due to unadjusted parental genotypes. MR using genetic association estimates derived from within-sibship models (within-sibship MR) can avoid these potential biases because genetic differences between siblings are due to random segregation at meiosis.</p>
METHODS: Applying both population and within-sibship MR, we estimated the effects of genetic liability to educational attainment on body mass index (BMI), cigarette smoking, systolic blood pressure (SBP) and all-cause mortality. MR analyses used individual-level data on 72 932 siblings from UK Biobank and the Norwegian HUNT study, and summary-level data from a within-sibship Genome-wide Association Study including >140 000 individuals.</p>
RESULTS: Both population and within-sibship MR estimates provided evidence that educational attainment decreased BMI, cigarette smoking and SBP. Genetic variant-outcome associations attenuated in the within-sibship model, but genetic variant-educational attainment associations also attenuated to a similar extent. Thus, within-sibship and population MR estimates were largely consistent. The within-sibship MR estimate of education on mortality was imprecise but consistent with a putative effect.</p>
CONCLUSIONS: These results provide evidence of beneficial individual-level effects of education (or liability to education) on adulthood health, independently of potential demographic and family-level confounders.</p>
47 Authors
- Laurence J Howe
- Humaira Rasheed
- Paul R Jones
- Dorret I Boomsma
- David M Evans
- Alexandros Giannelis
- Caroline Hayward
- John L Hopper
- Amanda Hughes
- Hannu Lahtinen
- Shuai Li
- Penelope A Lind
- Nicholas G Martin
- Pekka Martikainen
- Sarah E Medland
- Tim T Morris
- Michel G Nivard
- Jean-Baptiste Pingault
- Karri Silventoinen
- Jennifer A Smith
- Emily A Willoughby
- James F Wilson
- Rafael Ahlskog
- Ole A Andreassen
- Helga Ask
- Archie Campbell
- Rosa Cheesman
- Yoonsu Cho
- Kaare Christensen
- Elizabeth C Corfield
- Christina C Dahm
- Alexandra Havdahl
- William D Hill
- Shona M Kerr
- Antti Latvala
- Marianne Nygaard
- Teemu Palviainen
- Nancy L Pedersen
- Robert Plomin
- Melissa C Southey
- Camilla Stoltenberg
- Bjørn Olav Åsvold
- Øyvind E Næss
- George Davey Smith
- Jaakko Kaprio
- Ben Brumpton
- Neil M Davies
1 Application
| Application ID | Title |
|---|---|
| 8786 | The causal effects of education on behavioural risk factors, morbidity and all-cause and cause-specific mortality: evidence from the 500,000 participants of the UK biobank. |
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