Executive functions and intelligence- are there genetic difference?

Željka Nikolašević, Snežana Smederevac, Vojislava Bugarski Ignjatović, Jasmina Kodžopeljić, Ilija Milovanović, Mechthild Prinz and Zoran Budimlija

Intelligence, 2020, vol. 82, issue C

Abstract: The first aim of this study was to explore the aetiology of phenotypic relationships between different measures of executive functions. The second objective was to examine sources of the covariation between different measures of executive functions and the measure of general cognitive ability. The study sample consisted of 468 twins (154 pairs of monozygotic twins and 80 pairs of dizygotic twins) of the same and different gender who grew up together. Executive functions were evaluated by the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, the Trail Making Test – form B, and verbal fluency tests. Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices were used as a measure of general cognitive ability. The study results suggest a primarily genetic origin of the mutual covariation of different executive measures and their covariation with the general cognitive ability construct. While the shared genetic variance primarily lies in the bases of similarity/unity of the used cognitive measures, their particularity/difference is determined by a specific unshared environment. The obtained result on the presence of a single general genetic factor, which can be singled out in the case of different executive measures, at least partially speaks in favor of the thesis about the unity of various executive measures and the existence of a common basic ability. Together with the specific unshared environment, the specific genetic influence speaks in favor of a difference between each of the individual measures.

Keywords: Behavioral genetics; Cognitive abilities; Executive functions; General cognitive ability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289620300581
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:intell:v:82:y:2020:i:c:s0160289620300581

DOI: 10.1016/j.intell.2020.101480

Access Statistics for this article

Intelligence is currently edited by R.J. Haier

More articles in Intelligence from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().