Interaction between Parental Education and Twin Correlations for Cognitive Ability in a Norwegian Conscript Sample

We examine a sample of Norwegian twin conscripts for evidence of an interaction between parental education and the heritability of general cognitive ability (GA). Ability scores were obtained on 1706 pairs of twins who were conscripted into the Norwegian Armed Forces between 1931and 1960. Education scores were available for mothers and fathers; the majority of the parents had less than a high school education. GA scores were heteroscadistic with respect to mid-parent education, with reduced variability at higher levels of education. Both MZ and DZ twin correlations for GA were linearly and negatively related to mid-parent education, DZ twins substantially more so. When the model was extended to an ACE model consisting of standardized positive ACE variance components, the modification appeared to disappear. Further analysis revealed that this occurred because the steep decline of DZ twin correlations with increasing mid-parent education resulted in a violation of the classical twin model for much of the parameter space. Other phenomena that might result in large declines in DZ twin correlations are considered, along with implications for other studies of socioeconomic interactions with the heritability of GA in European samples.