A genome-wide association study of educational attainment in more than one million individuals implicates brain development and synaptic communication

In 2016, the Social Science Genetic Association Consortium (SSGAC) published a genome-wide association study of educational attainment (Okbay et al., 2016). The meta-analytic sample consisted of ~293,000 individuals. We... [ view full abstract ]

In 2016, the Social Science Genetic Association Consortium (SSGAC) published a genome-wide association study of educational attainment (Okbay et al., 2016). The meta-analytic sample consisted of ~293,000 individuals. We identified 74 loci containing one or more SNPs significantly associated with educational attainment. A predictor based on all SNPs in the meta-analysis accounted for 3.2 percent of the variance in educational attainment. Significant SNPs were disproportionately located in regions regulating gene expression in the fetal brain, and genes near the significant SNPs were strongly expressed in neural tissues, particularly during prenatal development. The genes were involved in developmental processes such as the proliferation of neural progenitors, the migration of newly born neurons, and axonogenesis. 

We are continuing to expand the meta-analysis of educational attainment. At the time of writing, our sample size exceeds 760,000. At the time of presentation, the sample size will be greater than one million. At present there are 530 quasi-independent significant SNPs; a predictor based on all SNPs accounts for more than 10 percent of the variance in educational attainment. The presentation will focus on the light shed by the GWAS results on the biological underpinnings of cognitive performance.