HERITABILITY STUDIES IN THE POSTGENOMIC ERA: THE FATAL FLAW IS CONCEPTUAL

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12060
• Author: RONALD L. SIMONS,CALLIE H. BURT
• Published date: 01 February 2015
• Date: 01 February 2015

HERITABILITY STUDIES IN THE POSTGENOMIC

ERA: THE FATAL FLAW IS CONCEPTUAL∗

CALLIEH.BURT

1and RONALD L. SIMONS2

1School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Arizona State University

2Department of Sociology, University of Georgia

KEYWORDS: heritability, biosocial criminology, postgenomics, epigenetics, plasticity

In the emerging postgenomic paradigm, we are confronted with a biological world

that is in many ways the opposite of that which has thus far enabled the methodologies

of behavioral genetics. (Charney, 2012: 61)

In our recent article, drawing on advances in the life sciences and echoing the calls

of prominent scholars, including renowned behavioral geneticists (e.g., Rutter, 1997;

Turkheimer, 2011),1we called for an end to heritability studies in criminology and a

recognition of the dubious nature of existing heritability estimates (Burt and Simons,

2014).2We argued that heritability studies are futile for two reasons: 1) Heritability stud-

ies suffer from serious methodological flaws with the overall effect of making estimates

inaccurate and biased toward inflated heritability and deflated shared environmental in-

fluences, and more importantly, 2) the conceptual biological model on which heritability

studies depend—that of identifiably separate effects of genes versus the environment on

phenotype variance—is unsound. The aim of our original article was to educate readers

about both the (often unacknowledged) methodological assumptions and the (outdated)

biological model undergirding heritability studies, evidence that evinces that the heri-

tability study should be superannuated. Our goal was not to foreclose but to reinvigorate

∗Additional supporting information can be found in the listing for this article in the Wiley Online

Library at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/crim.2015.53.issue-1/issuetoc. [Correction

added on 4 October 2016, after first online publication: The URL http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/

doi/10.1111/crim.2011.53.issue-1/issuetoc was changed to http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/

crim.2015.53.issue-1/issuetoc.]

The authors gratefully acknowledge Kara Hannula, John Laub, D. Wayne Osgood, Alex Piquero,

and Sara Wakefield for valuable comments on earlier drafts of this rejoinder. The arguments pre-

sented herein are entirely those of the authors and do not reflect the views of those who provided

feedback. A longer version of this article is available from the first author. Direct all correspon-

dence to Callie H. Burt, School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Arizona State University, 411

N. Central Ave, Ste. 600, Phoenix, AZ 85004 (e-mail: chburt@asu.edu).

1. Surprisingly, Wright et al. (2015) question our citing of Turkheimer as calling for an end to heri-

tability studies; this rather captious line of attack, consistent with a “hitting it over the head style”

defense, is belied by the facts. For clear quotes repudiating Wright et al.’s claim that Turkheimer is

still advocating for the continued use of heritability studies, see Turkheimer (2011: 598; 2014: 532).

2. When it suits their purpose, Barnes et al. (2014) and Wright et al. (2015) incorrectly broaden our

critique to behavioral genetics and/or biosocial research generally. We have clearly noted through-

out that the heritability study method, including its fallacious technical and conceptual assump-

tions, is the focus of our critique, not behavioral genetics or biosocial work in general.

C2015 American Society of Criminology doi: 10.1111/1745-9125.12060

CRIMINOLOGY Volume 53 Number 1 103–112 2015 103