Marital migration and genetic structure in Kitee, Finland

A genetic analysis of marital migration in Kitee, Finland, is presented. The data are based on 9970 marriages which took place between 1750 and 1877. The results of this analysis are compared with those of previous studies of the population of the Aland Islands, Finland. Analysis of inter-subdivision genetic kinship matrices shows that genetic heterogeneity in Kitee is substantially less than in Aland. This is due primarily to higher rates of migration, both between subdivisions and from outside the population, in Kitee compared to Aland. These differences in migration rates can in turn be attributed to greater geographic isolation in Aland and the contrasting social structures of the two populations. Because of differences in geographic structure and population distribution, geographic distance between subdivisions is a better predictor of inter-subdivision genetic kinship in Kitee than in Aland. The Aland Islands are known to have high frequencies of several otherwise rare genetic diseases; in addition, these diseases are distributed very non-randomly among Aland's subdivisions. The genetic structure results presented here suggest that Kitee should have a less unique distribution of genetic diseases.