Heritability is the process of passing personal traits from one generation to another. It never demonstrates the magnitude to which genes are passed on from a parent to a child; instead, it illustrates the reason for differences between people. The transferred traits can either impose defects or be advantageous to an organism, depending on the genes present within the parents. For example, some human conditions, such as albinism, are transmitted from fathers and mothers to their offspring. Although heritability is a wide topic, Rosa Hoekstra and her colleagues believe that the difference is seen more in close family members.
Hoekstra et al.’s concept illustrates that the only reason people possess different autistic traits is heritability. According to their research, autism is a gene that can be transferred from parents to their offspring. Therefore, it describes the extent to which an individual’s gene exposes them to a condition. Hoekstra et al.’s statement demonstrates that the traits can be witnessed within close family members. For example, monozygotic twins experience autism more than dizygotic children because the identical twins are closer since they originate from a single egg (Hoekstra et al., 2007). Freberg (2018) supports this assertion by illustrating that gene differences in people affect their response to drugs. Therefore, identical twins are more likely to experience autism traits if their parents possess the genes.
To summarize, heritability shows differences in personal traits instead of genes that are passed from one generation to another. The process is best explained by Hoekstra et al., who gives an insight into why identical twins have more similar traits compared to fraternal twins. Genes present in a person determine if a person can experience life conditions such as autism that are witnessed in many people.
References
Freberg, L. (2018). Discovering behavioral neuroscience: An introduction to biological psychology (4th ed.). Cengage Learning.
Hoekstra, R. A., Bartels, M., Verweij, C. J., & Boomsma, D. I. (2007). Heritability of autistic traits in the general population.Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 161(4), 372-377. Web.