Intergenerational transmission of brain structure and function in humans: a narrative review of designs, methods, and findings

• Published in: Brain structure & function Vol. 229; no. 6; pp. 1327 - 1348
• Main Authors: Constant-Varlet, Charlotte, Nakai, Tomoya, Prado, Jérôme
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.07.2024; Springer Nature B.V; Springer Verlag
• Subjects: Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biomedicine; Brain - diagnostic imaging; Brain - physiology; Cell Biology; Child; Children; Children & youth; Cognitive Sciences; Environmental factors; Functional anatomy; Humans; Life Sciences; Medical imaging; Neuroimaging; Neuroimaging - methods; Neurology; Neurons and Cognition; Neurosciences; Parents; Phenotype; Phenotypes; Review; Standardization; Structure-function relationships; Intergenerational neuroimaging; Intergenerational transmission; Heritability; Parent-child similarity; Cerebral marker; Multigenerational study; Intergenerational neuroimaging Cerebral marker Intergenerational transmission Parent-child similarity Multigenerational study Heritability Highlights; Heritability Highlights
• ISSN: 1863-2661; 1863-2653; 1863-2661; 0340-2061
• DOI: 10.1007/s00429-024-02804-5

Children often show cognitive and affective traits that are similar to their parents. Although this indicates a transmission of phenotypes from parents to children, little is known about the neural underpinnings of that transmission. Here, we provide a general overview of neuroimaging studies that explore the similarity between parents and children in terms of brain structure and function. We notably discuss the aims, designs, and methods of these so-called intergenerational neuroimaging studies, focusing on two main designs: the parent-child design and the multigenerational design. For each design, we also summarize the major findings, identify the sources of variability between studies, and highlight some limitations and future directions. We argue that the lack of consensus in defining the parent-child transmission of brain structure and function leads to measurement heterogeneity, which is a challenge for future studies. Additionally, multigenerational studies often use measures of family resemblance to estimate the proportion of variance attributed to genetic versus environmental factors, though this estimate is likely inflated given the frequent lack of control for shared environment. Nonetheless, intergenerational neuroimaging studies may still have both clinical and theoretical relevance, not because they currently inform about the etiology of neuromarkers, but rather because they may help identify neuromarkers and test hypotheses about neuromarkers coming from more standard neuroimaging designs. Highlights We review neuroimaging studies investigating neural markers of traits transmission. Studies have used both parent-child and multigenerational designs. Studies provide insights but suffer from lack of methodological standardization. Multigenerational studies should also account for shared environment.