Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T07:37:32.942Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Season of Birth of Schizophrenic, Neurotic and Psychiatrically Normal Twins

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

Kenneth S. Kendler
Kenneth S. Kendler*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry and Schizophrenia Biologic Research Centre, Bronx Veteran's Administration Medical Center, 130 W. Kingsbridge Rd, Bronx, NY 10468 and Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry, Mt Sinai School of Medicine, NY, NY
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

The quarter of birth of 536 schizophrenic, 1,991 neurotic and 12,085 psychiatrically normal twin pairs from the National Academy of Sciences-National Research Council Twin Registry was compared. When either all twin pairs, or only monozygotic or dizygotic twin pairs, were considered, no significant differences were found in the quarter of birth between the 3 groups. No difference in quarter of birth was found for twin pairs concordant versus discordant for schizophrenia. Despite the increased risk for intrauterine and perinatal complications in twin births, schizophrenic twins appear (at least) to be no more vulnerable than schizophrenic singletons to the seasonal gestation and birth-related insults which probably underlie the seasonality in schizophrenic births. Controlling for season of birth probably has little effect on the results of twin studies of schizophrenia.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 141 , Issue 2 , August 1982 , pp. 186 - 190
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1982 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Benirschke, K. & Kim, C. K. (1973) Multiple pregnancy. New England Journal of Medicine, 288, 1276–84 and 1329–36.Google Scholar
Dalen, P. (1975) Seasons of Birth: A Study of Schizophrenia and other Mental Disorders. Amsterdam: North-Holland.Google Scholar
Gottesman, I. I. & Shields, J. (1966) Contributions of twin studies to perspectives on schizophrenia. In Progress in Experimental Personality Research, Vol 3, (ed. Maher, B. A.). New York: Academic Press Google Scholar
Gottesman, I. I. & Shields, J. (1972) Schizophrenia and Genetics: A Twin Study Vantage Point. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Gottesman, I. I. & Shields, J. (1976) A critical review of recent adoption, twin, and family studies of schizophrenia: behavioral genetics perspectives. Schizophrenia Bulletin, 2, 360–98.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hare, E., Price, J. & Slater, E. (1974) Mental disorder and season of birth: A national sample compared with the general population. British Journal of Psychiatry, 124, 81–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hare, E. & Morgan, P. (1981) A relation between seasonal temperature and the birth rate of schizophrenic patients. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 63, 396–405.Google Scholar
Hrubec, Z. & Neel, J. V. (1978) The national academy of sciences–national research council twin registry: Ten years of operation. In Twin Research: Biology and Epidemiology, (ed. Nance, W. E.). New York: Alan R. Liss Google Scholar
Jablon, S., Neel, J. V., Gershowitz, H. & Atkinson, G. F. (1967) The NAS–NRC twin panel: Methods of construction of the panel, zygosity diagnosis and proposed use. American Journal of Human Genetics, 19, 133–61.Google Scholar
James, W. H. (1976) Seasonality in twin births. Annals of Human Biology, 3, 193–5.Google Scholar
Kinney, D. K. & Jacobsen, B. (1978) Environmental factors in schizophrenia: New adoption study evidence. In The Nature of Schizophrenia: New Approaches to Research and Treatment, (ed. Wynne, L. C., Cromwell, R. L. and Matthysse, S.). New York: Wiley Google Scholar
Parker, G. (1978) The season of birth in anxiety neurotics. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, 12, 69–71.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pulver, A. E., Sawyer, J. W. & Childs, B. (1981) The association between season of birth and the risk for schizophrenia. American Journal of Epidemiology, 114, 735–49.Google Scholar
Torrey, E. F. (1980) Schizophrenia and Civilization. New York: Aronson.Google Scholar
Torrey, E. F. Torrey, B. B. & Peterson, M. R. (1977) Seasonality of schizophrenia births in the United States. Archives of General Psychiatry, 34, 1065–70.Google Scholar
Torrey, E. F. Torrey, B. B. (1979) A shifting seasonality of schizophrenic births. British Journal of Psychiatry, 134, 183–6.Google Scholar
Videbech, T., Weeke, A. & Dupont, A. (1974) Endogenous psychoses and season of birth. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 50, 202–18.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.