The developmental association between eating disorders symptoms and symptoms of depression and anxiety in juvenile twin girls.
OBJECTIVE
We investigated the role of genetic and environmental factors in the developmental association among symptoms of eating disorders, depression, and anxiety syndromes in 8-13-year-old and 14-17-year-old twin girls.


METHODS
Multivariate genetic models were fitted to child-reported longitudinal symptom data gathered from clinical interview on 408 MZ and 198 DZ female twin pairs from the Virginia Twin Study of Adolescent Behavioural Development (VTSABD).


RESULTS
Model-fitting revealed distinct etiological patterns underlying the association among symptoms of eating disorders, depression, overanxious disorder (OAD), and separation anxiety disorder (SAD) during the course of development: 1) a common genetic factor influencing liability to all symptoms - of early and later OAD, depression, SAD, and eating symptoms; 2) a distinct genetic factor specifically indexing liability to early eating disorders symptoms; 3) a shared environmental factor specifically influencing early depression and early eating disorders symptoms; and 4) a common environmental factor affecting liability to symptoms of later eating disorders and both early and later separation anxiety.


CONCLUSIONS
These results suggest a pervasive genetic effect that influences liability to symptoms of over-anxiety, separation anxiety, depression, and eating disorder throughout development, a shared environmental influence on later adolescent eating problems and persistent separation anxiety, genetic influences specific to early eating disorders symptoms, and a shared environmental factor influencing symptoms of early eating and depression.
Silberg
Judy L
JL
Department of Human Genetics and Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA.
Bulik
Cynthia M
CM
D000293:Adolescent; D000856:Anorexia Nervosa / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000523:psychology; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000523:psychology; D001010:Anxiety, Separation / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics / Q000523:psychology; D002032:Bulimia / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000523:psychology; D002648:Child; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000235:genetics* / Q000523:psychology; D004200:Diseases in Twins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008957:Models, Genetic; D010552:Personality Assessment; D010641:Phenotype; D012307:Risk Factors; D012931:Social Environment; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D014429:Twins, Dizygotic / Q000235:genetics / Q000523:psychology; D014430:Twins, Monozygotic / Q000235:genetics / Q000523:psychology; D014768:Virginia