title: Genetic and environmental contributions to anxiety among Chinese children and adolescents--a multi-informant twin study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Child and adolescent anxiety has become a major public health concern in China, but little was known about the etiology of anxiety in Chinese children and adolescents. The present study aimed to investigate genetic and environmental influences on trait anxiety among Chinese children and adolescents. Rater, sex, and age differences on these estimates were also examined.
  
  
  METHODS
  Self-reported and parent-reported child's trait anxiety was collected from 1,104 pairs of same-sex twins aged 9-18 years. Genetic models were fitted to data from each informant to determine the genetic (A), shared (C), and non-shared environmental (E) influences on trait anxiety.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The parameter estimates and 95% confidence intervals (CI) of A, C, E on self-reported trait anxiety were 50% [30%, 60%], 5% [0%, 24%], 45% [40%, 49%]. For parent-reported data, the corresponding parameter estimates were 63% [47%, 78%], 13% [1%, 28%], and 24% [22%, 27%], respectively. The heritability of anxiety was higher in girls for self-reported data, but higher in boys for parent-reported data. There was no significant age difference in genetic and environmental contributions for self-reported data, but a significant increase of heritability with age for parent-reported data.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The trait anxiety in Chinese children and adolescents was highly heritable. Non-shared environmental factors also played an important role. The estimates of genetic and environmental effects differed by rater, sex and age. Our findings largely suggest the cross-cultural generalizability of the etiological model of child and adolescent anxiety.
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of Mental Health, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.forename: Xinying
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Jianxin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000367:Age Factors; D001007:Anxiety / Q000209:etiology* / Q000235:genetics*; D002648:Child; D002681:China; D004777:Environment; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010290:Parents; D057566:Self Report; D012737:Sex Factors
keywords: Anxiety; Chinese children and adolescents; genetic and environmental influence; heritability; twin study